The Manipulator

Page was once again stomped awake by his trusty companion, Sheffield, pulling him from up upon his dreams in heaven right back down to earth with all the grace of a piano falling in a cartoon. He had been assigned a mission with a new shinobi in the village, fresh blood from Konoha, similar to him. He thought maybe he wasn't the best person for the mission, but reading further in the details he found it was something he had quite the proficiency for, tracking and capturing a genjutsu wielding menace. Figure may as well not spend any energy worrying about it and just get to the meeting point by the market square, the former farmer thought, getting properly dressed after keeping up the usual personal hygiene stuff, Sheffield tied his headband around his left arm, and tied a similar but longer headband around Sheffield's neck like a scarf before heading down the stairs of the tea shop he resided over and leaving towards the market square.

The fairly old genin wandered abouts the market searching for his partner, the only information afforded to him being "Bandages," until he saw a young man covered damn near head to toe in bandages, he approached and started raising his hand, about to say his greeting when the man whipped around and introduced himself first. "Yep, thats me, Page, just Page. Nice to meet you Shizo, this right here," he started, before pointing at the dog next to him, "is Sheffield, pleasure to meet you and all that fun stuff, I hear right that this is your first mission?" he would ask.

"Yeah, I've taken down some genjutsu users in my time, and I warn you this, don't get too cocky about that kinda stuff, those eyes of yours may be real skilled at seeing through illusions but that aint the only way to sink in the mud of an illusion, got to keep keen control of your other senses too," Page warned the younger genin, being cautious of previous mistakes he's seen others make.

"Chances are these types mostly travel in the night, but there is some important prep work gotta do, don't worry nothing too big, just a little work to look out for if this guy, so to speak of course, seen plenty of women doing this, strikes during the day, but hey, maybe while we're doing this we can swap stories a little. First thing I got to do around here is attune my nose, got a keen sense of smell, I do, and I have to make sure that any newcomers in the area are thoroughly checked out to see if they match the description of a," he interrupted his speaking, pulling out a dossier on the case, "man dressed in stark white and black, jesus christ it's a wonder this guy ain't been caught yet, that should stick out like a sore thumb. I hear he strikes in the market at night, hence this place as the meetup. I'll get used to these smells, but in the meantime I don't suppose there is a problem with talking shit as we do some recognisance."

"Honestly, might just be best we catch em, pretty sure we can get the drop on em especially if we detect them early on, but that's besides the point, you bring up something smart," Page would stop for a second, realizing he had set up such a serious atmosphere he may have been making the younger genin uncomfortable, so he dropped his highly tactical demeanor and adopted a much more casual stance, flipping like a switch, "I also came from Konoha, nice to meet a fellow country man, but my days as a shinobi there were long passed even before I came to the village hidden in the sand. I use to work with the leaf, but we had a bit of a falling out and I decided to take up the life of a farmer, sadly after 15 years of it, my farm done dried up and I was put in a position to take up this work again. Suna was my first stop in what I planned to be many, but they were just so damn welcoming I joined up full time. Met Sheffield here the last day of my farm and we just hit it off so damn well haven't separated since." Page would continue to talk casually with Shizo checking on each new person that entered the market square, investigating for their perp's MO and preparing to attack when the manipulator would show up.

WC: 764

"Yeah, though to be honest not to proud of my time in the land of fire, not my shining moments," Page would admit, laughing it off a little bit. "But yeah," he continued, "The farming life was great, but it didn't pan out so good so here I am, just hoping one day to retire as opposed to being 'retired.'"

"Me and Shef are recently met yeah, but we are quick and good friends. I don't know his breed, all I know is he's a troublemaker, but a good boy at heart, ain't ya," Page would break off his speech to give his dog some pets. "Smell stuff just... comes with a lot of training, I'm sure you if you put your mind to it you could similarly get to my level, but with sight like yours you probably won't need it," the former farmer lied, trying to cover up any specific details about his past to avoid more questions about his time in the leaf, something he didn't want to delve back into.

"Not going to lie to you," Page said, having already lied in the conversation but trying to move the conversation along there in order to avoid questioning, "the bandages are pretty damn noticeable, you may see some people around here that went through pretty massive surgery similarly wrapped up, but not anyone matches the kind of comfort with it you possess," the former farmer and his hound noticeably winced when the fellow Sand Shinobi told them of how he got the bandages, fire did not sound like a helluva time, "You know, there are some pretty talented medical ninjas here, if you ever want some help with skin grafts or something, I'm sure they could help. Hey! Shef, stop that!" Page would end up yelling at his animal companion, attempting to get them to stop picking at the bandages.


They would continue talking until dusk, Page juggling conversation and sensing, eventually suggesting, "Anyway we should get searching for that fellow that's been stirring up shit, show him what for and all that fun stuff, bes-" Page interrupted himself with a pronounced sniffing, "Someone new is around, and judging by the smell I get... sinister vibes, let's check it out." Page would lead Shizo to the figure he smelled, revealing...


WC: 383, TWC: 1147

Page would approach the figure at an extremely fast rate, running full speed and getting an eyeful of the suspect, Sheffield approaching the figure from the opposite side and Shizo serving as another angle to this triple threat approach on the possible manipulator. Sensing that he had been detected, he started to weave hand signs, but the three sand shinobi were far too quick, Page attacking above to grab his hands and prevent the signs from being thrown and the genjutsu from being cast and holding him in place. Shizo would launch an attack from behind to incapacitate the foe, directly bursting into their spine. And Sheffield, with the most important of all tasks, would rip into the mans groin, causing excruciating pain and completely preventing him from keeping up any sort of attack. The three had taken down the assailant, who now fainted from a combination of blood loss and pain, and Page went to unmask the foe, who looked like someone Page had never met, perhaps Shizo had seen him someplace before.

"Well," the former farmer would open up, "looks like that is that in terms of the mission, all that is left now is taking him back down to mission control in order to claim our reward and take a little fear out of the village folk. Say, I've got to get to another mission after this, but you seem like a pretty goddamn cool customer, we should try to link up sometime for something that ain't a mission, it'd be sick to meet up again, but for now I think you should take them to the station and I'll collect my payment when I'm picking up my next job. For now, see you around," Page would bid his fellow former Konoha, current Suna shinobi farewell, then move on to his next mission. He like the guy, but he had a busy schedule for the day and sadly couldn't go get barbecue with him like he usually is one to do.

As Sheffield and Page moved on with their day, he would think back to the Hyuuga he met earlier, there was a spark in him, one that he feared would get put out, one that he sincerely wished would not get stomped out. Sheffield detected these thoughts and tried to comfort his master, but the man's mind was still abound with potential pessimistic thoughts, and the former farmer began to think of all the good that could happen, he tried to distract himself with work and these pleasant thoughts, but the baseline of worry would not escape him, no matter how hard he tried.

WC:438, TWC: 1,585

10 Stats to Page
5 Stats to Sheffield

Earth Shaker B Rank 1552/1750
Finishing off from Here
Storage Displacement 500/500

approved