follow up to a puppet sup(P/IO Niko)

Well this was a pain. Saya watched as the chest compartment of the opposing pinochio puppet opened up. It seemed like he wasn't terribly keen on the idea of her making furniture while they battled. That was a real shame. She was excited for this new technique, part because it was a way of getting really cheap dwellings, furniture, boats, really anything she might need, and partially because it was excting to have a technique whose purpose wasn't solely to cause harm. There was so much good she could do for the world using this new jutsu. She could also use it to protect against senbon. Her wooden arm pointed downward. THe cofee table before her shifted to a position where it's tabletop made a shield between the weapons and the girl, and she waited for the heart wrenching sound of cuts and breaking of her new furnature. The sound never came.

From his position two meters beside Ai The pinochio puppet opened his own chest doors the moment he saw the opponents. Impressively, he timed the mechanism to fire just fast enough that his own senbon met with the opposing puppets, and with a ringing of metal the weapons fell harmlessly to the ground spent. He seemed pretty satisfied with himself as he brushed his hands together to knock the dust off before his palm pressed the door in his chest closed gently.

meanwhile on Ai's side she watched the small puppet fire as the strings lengthened....towards her? It seems she'd found where the puppet master was, and he made the decision to attack Ai instead of shifting to continue his assault on the smaller and weaker puppet. That was fine. She waited until he was within two feet, and then shifted to the left. With the combination of sound and basing his body movements off of where the one hand she could see was she struck, sending a front kick specifically to where the strings ended, her body no longer in a position where his taijutsu could hit. They had a plan, of course, but it wasn't quite time to impliment the set up she'd been preparing since Niko first started rushing towards them, and so she danced back another foot if the kick landed, and prepared for a second volley.

It wouldn't matter, considering there was no way he could see the puppet who was effectively behind him now due to the position of the Ai puppet, but as the last senbon hit the ground Saya's pinochio gave the boy a thumbs up before taking a defensive stance. Saya glanced around her shield, and then lifted it back above her head about two feet from her body so that she could once again fully see what was happening.

(TWC 5248)

Niko was impressed. First the girl had excelently countered his own puppets mechanism by making her Pinocchio puppet oppose his and activating the mechanism at the same time. Watching the metal needles hit against each other harmlessly he knew his attack had not worked. Watching the small child puppet dust himself off he was quite irritated. Saya was quite obviously not taking him seriously. But Nico attempted to ignore that and focus on the much more active engagement he was currently participating in.

Watching the puppet slam its arms into his left arm, which was manipulating the chakra threads he knew how she had done it. The puppet or the puppeteer had found the origin of the chakra strings which where very visible and attacked him. He knew this was a weakness in his plan when he sent the Pinocchio puppet to disrupt the enemy combatant. That his strings would be visible. Nico thought that the attack on the main body would be distracting enough for her to miss such a glaring flaw in his plan but he was sorely mistaken

Yelping in pain as he saw the puppet crush his hand he instantly realized that it was broken. He immediately lost control of the Pinocchio puppet because of the deactivating chakra threads. Still invisible he ran towards a log that was nearby and sat on it rummaging through the bag on his back for the bandages he had on him at all times. He took the bandages and wrapped it around his arm. The puppet was insanely strong. Niko slipped up for a mere moment and one attack took him down.

Turning to face Saya with a defeated smile he says "well looks like you won this bout." pointing towards the hand which lay in his lap. The girl had destroyed him and mocked him while doing so. He was not mad, he was more disappointed with himself. Picking himself up he approached the puppeteer.
(TWC 3222)

HECK! heck heck heck heck heck heck. She knew that her sister was fast, but had counted on her recognizing that this was a battle amonst friends to ensure she wouldn't LITERALLY DESTROY HIS PUPPET USING ARM. This was bad. This was like. bad bad. She dropped the cofee table as he rushed towards his bag. It landed perfectly in front of the chair she'd been sitting in. With a quick leap, her free hand planted on the center of the furnature, allowing her to catpass over and off of the coach puppet.

"I'm so so so so so sorry. Oh em gee. I didn't think Ai would actually hurt you, AI WHY DID YOU ACTUALLY HURT HIM!!!!" She'd stand by as he unfurled the bandages. What could she do? She'd heard about ninjutsu that had the ability to heal wounds but she'd not been able to get the hang of actually using it yet. it was on her list, but there was this whole thing with a dream and then she had to spend like. so much time making a brand new puppet and she still had music to plan and outfits to make once the music was done, she was just so busy.

"I um. I'm sorry. I didn't think that ammount of force would cause damage but I think my heel slipped in when I was aiming my kick. I Only intended to barelly touch him. " She also walked over to where the two were sitting, palms raised in a defensive stance that she hoped would assure him that she meant no further harm.

"Are. Are you ok? Can I help? "As he approached she was already there, her incredible speed mixed with skillful artistry with a human body to cross the distance just that much more quickly. "I promise, She wasn't supposed to actually hurt you. She was just meant to pressure you into a position where she pushed you to your right. The plan was to shift again to put you between herself and I and then catch you with skillful artistry......And then drop a cofee table on you to claim the win but like. That's just cuz I just got this new jutsu and I wanted to see if it had combat potential. One day I really hope I can build an entire house and then drop that on someone. I think it'd be cool. Really though we didn't mean to hurt you like at all!!!" She danced about, trying to think of a way, any way that she could actually help the situation. Should she scoop him up in the coach puppet and rush him off at high speeds towards the hospital? Had she already done enough and needed to leave before she broke something else? This was the part of combat she hated. This was why she'd sworn to do everything in her power to stop the blood shed and find more peaceful resolutions.

"Aya calm yourself. It won't do to have you dancing around trying to do something and end up causing more pain because you're manic and worried. I really am sorry Niko. "

(TWC 5771)

Niko sat there contemplating the reality of what she said. Had she not meant to do such damage? Or had her holding back her power still manage to overwhelm him. The though was depressing. He had trained for so long and hard just to be defeated by one attack from a puppet no less. It was humiliating. Taking note of the girls surprise he knew the later was true. He was just too weak, she was correct in underestimating him, though that may be the wrong word. Niko was simply to weak to fight ninja of such a level. Maybe in the future but if they could not weaken themselves massively even in a spar he could lose his very life.

"im fine, just hurt for a little bit. Though I guess that means your the winner. Next time ill be sure to improve, hell maybe i will surpass you." Chuckling, that was extremely unlikely, nursing his broken hand in his lap he wondered if he should head to the medical center. Deciding against it he continued to speak.

"Ill probably get this checked out on my own time, first I would like to go over the spar." Taking some time to breathe and let the words soak in Nico continued, "Though I noticed some flaws in my techniques and strategy it may be better for you to point them out, I personally only saw one flaw in your combat. When I activated my invisibility technique it became apparent that you could not see or sense me. Instead you had to stay on defense. Maybe investing in some sort of detection technique or increasing your sensory skills would work."

"I assure you, dropping a whole house on someone would probably kill them." Nico smiled through the now small amounts of pain. Why would she need to test such a theory, the thought kind of hurt. Nico thought 'her plan was to crush me under furniture, that would have hurt much more than this hand.' 

"all, in all the spar was fun I don't think I have enjoyed myself that much in months. When I get this hand fixed up we should have another go."
(TWC 3586)

This was the worst. Leave it to saya and her team to get over excited at the chance to test her metal, or wood in this case, against an opponent and end up screwing it all up and possibly even putting him in the hospital. what if she broke his arm. What if she broke his arm in a way that was dificult to fix and it ended up putting small fragments of bone in his veins and those are bleeding as we speak just enough to not be noticable but then he goes home and goes to sleep like normal and it continues bleeding and he doesn't wake up and its all because Ai decided to kick him too hard. Was this how she'd get her first official kill?! no. That would actually ruin everything. She wouldn't be able to live with herself if she accidentally assassinated this promising young puppet master through secret bone in vein blood letting. Ai, who'd already commented once trying to calm her sister down once again stepped forward, putting her palm on Saya's shoulder.

"Stop. He's not going to die from secret bone in vein injuries that slowly and inperceptibly cause him to bleed out in his sleep. Someone has been reading far too many ninja books. He'll be hurt for a bit, he'll head to the hospital and they'll fix everything lickety split with some medical ninjutsu. " She gripped saya's shoulder firmly to help her calm her erratic mind. Slowly her shoulders sunk and her worries seemed to quell.

"Yea. You uh. You'll totally get me next time though. I only barelly won this time cuz of luck i'm pretty sure. No way it would ever happen again cuz you're just supah strong n stuff." She tried her best to tend to his bruised ego since she couldn't help his broken wrist. Would it have the effect she wanted? Probably not, but she had to try.

" You're going a little overboard there Tria. Still he will improve with practice. It was a good bet to go for Ai instead of me. With both girls deciding not to actually use ninjutsu for this fight since they haven't seen you use any and wanted to make it fair, she was definitely the weaker opponent. " Saya and Ai scoffed in unison, then glanced at each other in shock. They were still getting used to the whole being able to talk at the same time thing. It was nice, but kind of wierd.

"Hm. Yea I don't really know much about sensory techniques. Like I have basic chakra sensory but it didn't work on your technique. Maybe I'll get lucky and a cute little critter with a specialization in sensory will show itself to me and we can become best friends and then he'll be able to support me in battle using his sensory skills to be my eyes in case something like this happens again. That would be super neat. " Right. There are times when Saya got a little carried away, and then there was this. What were the chances that the girl would meet a random creature inside of a village who happened to have sensory specialization and be willing to help her out for no reason other then because she was nice?! It was a rediculous idea.

"I also had lots of fun though! I'm ready to spar basically whenever you are! It's super neat to be able to test my strength against an opponent who isn't trying to kill me. On missions they're always trying to kill me which is tough because I never want to actually kill them and then it gets real awkward. "

(TWC 6384)

Nico was a little confused, had Saya actually thought he had some kind of rare bone disease. He knew for almost certain that he did not have a rare bone disease. The puppeteers sister was correct, once he went to the hospital he would be fine after they used some of the medical jutsu. For a moment Nico thought about, thought about picking up the specialization before deciding against that. He simply did not have the time to put effort into the field. He might pick up a low level medical ninjutsu on his own time, but for the moment he would focus on avoiding hits before fixing them.

"for some reason I highly doubt you believe that, though I have to believe your sister when she says your were holding out on me." Nico then watched the girl and her puppet overlap there voice again, even though the voice still originated from the same girl. Smirking Nico turned his head to look towards the young puppeteer. 

"you are aware that sensory is my second proficiency right? Imp not well versed in the techniques but with a little training I could probably detect medium level stealth ninja, though on the topic of helping I was wondering if you could teach me some chakra suppression. Having invisible strings would be a nice addition to my technique." Niko really needed to get a hang on chakra suppression having invisible strings as well as invisibility would make the technique so much better.

"yeah people trying to kill you in a fight really is detrimental hugh" Sweat dropping briefly Nico then continues, "I'm kidding, really. Though if you need help on missions at the moment I think I would be quite the opposite, I would rather you take someone more talented, it would be much more safe."
(TWC 3888)

"What?! Nooo. Ignore pinochio. I was uh. I was so worried about focusing on your attacks that my sister and I both forgot that we could use ninjutsu? Thats plausable. Yea." It was not plausible at all. Still she was trying very hard to help ease the stress of having lost so quickly. Saya was like that. She'd build up the world around her so that, even if just for a moment, they could have the joy she thought they deserved. Even enemies would find her obnoxiously positive, almost to the point of being mocking, but it wasn't that. If she had to defeat an enemy for a mission she wanted them to know it wasn't because they weren't good enough, it was just that she was born a genius.

"I uh. I didn't know that. Honestly I didn't even know that sensory was a specialization. I don't really get around much. I mean like i've met a bunch of people in the village but I can't say i've ever met a sensory ninja, or like. Someone who was open about having capabilities in sensory techniques. I didn't actually know there were sensory techniques--asside from being able to control your chakra at a level that it allowed you to feel if there were other chakra signatures around you. That's honestly really hecking cool!!!" She'd listen as Niko commented on chakra supression. When had she even learned to do it. If she were being honest, she'd just wondered one day after defeating the assassin who was now one of her best friends, and found that if she focused she could control her chakra levels to the point that she could give the illusion of not having chakra at all.

"Yea.. Um. So.. I kinda just did it? So i was thinking about Ai, and how the only real difference between us was that I definitely had a chakra signature and she didn't. Wanted to fix that so we could be more alike yanno? So i just focused all of my chakra on being as small as possible--i'm really good at being real small. And then I guess it just worked? Then I realized I could do the same with chakra threads. I just focused on the bare minimum ammount of chakra needed to use them and wam bam. They flickered in and out of existence for a few moments and then gone. Done. Invisibility. It's so helpful when we're meeting someone new cuz Ai doesn't like for me to talk to people I've not met cuz I have a tendency to be very loud and trusting. THis way its real hard to tell which of us is which and she can keep herself between threads and me. " She accounted the entire story of how she'd learned supression herself. It had happened the same way she learned chakra infusion and sensory. She just decided one day to see if she could and she could.

"Yea it's my least favorite part of missions. I wish they'd just be friends and stop being bad. But if you wanna do a mission some time you could definitely come! I usually do them with my friend daiko, or my friend Kiku, or my teacher travin, or that one time with nasu, but heck It's always easier with more people so like. You can definitely tag along so we can get th em done way faster!" That was Saya's gift. She didn't consider if he'd be a detriment to the team. He needed money from missions and she needed to do missions for...whatever reason pinochio had for why she needed to do missions, so if she needed to kick it up a notch to look after him she simply would.

(TWC 7007)

Nico decide against ignoring the girl. He had enough evidence to be pitied and talked down to. The girl had quite honestly gone easy on him he had expected it but knowing it and having it said directly to his face was quite different. And by quite different he meant very different. Trying his best to disregard her and focus on what the girl would say next.

"Sensory is one of the less known specialties it mostly revolves around marking your opponents or allies to track them over long periods, but there are subsects that focus more on cancelling out others sensory. The technique i used during the fight was a b-rank in the sensory field. I don't realty know why i am able to use some of the techniques i have never really studied the specialty, its like the skill is in my blood." Nico thought briefly on why he was able to use sensory techniques. He himself had not studied them almost at all, which was quite the opposite when compared with his puppetry.

"your explanation does make some sense, what i have learned about chakra and techniques is while seals and chakra usage is important most of the time intention and belief can help me at least manipulate the chakra needed for a technique. Let me give it a try." In his mind Nico had metaphysical bottled all the excess chakra he was exerting trying his best to embody what he thought a ninja was.

What Nico did not realize was that his first attempt was a success, he had managed to hide his chakra springing his chakra strings to life while restraining his chakra was easier than he may have thought. He then looked for the chakra strings, briefly thinking he had failed to create them he sent what would be his strings towards his deactivated Pinocchio puppet seeing it spark to life he said. 

"hmm this was a lot easier than I had anticipated I thought the process would take quite a number of attempts but never mind that, have you any more wisdom to impart me" Nursing his wound he would meet the girls eyes.
(TWC 4249)

As nico began to talk, Saya focused in. It actually suprised Pinochio. She was taking in every detail of what he said, making a point to commit it to memory with her eyes closed to shut out external stimulus. Then pinochio understood why. His mind was filled with information on the sensory specialization. Of course, she was transferring all of this extraneous knowledge directly to his personality. Why would she hold the information herself when that space could be used for less productive things that involved fabric or musical notation. He let out a sigh of frustration. While she could be quite a pain in the ass, she was at least consistent. 

"Honestly that  sounds really hecking helpful. I wonder if you could make your puppets invisible the same way! This battle would have ended so much different if I couldn't just tell the basic area that you were in because there was a puppet floating around without visible strings. Heck. I woulda had to use my chakra threads to fish for where you were intead of trying to figure out what side of the pinochio puppet you were actually standing on. " She realized quickly that his ability to make himself unsensable would be a huge benefit. If he'd been able to hide the puppet and the threads together, It would have been incredibly dificult to figure out where he was. Granted she had more than enough threads to just set up a grid around her and catch anything that entered it like a fly in a web, but she wouldn't say that directly. She watched intently as he attempted the same skill use she'd been showing off since they met. He seemed a natural. That kind of made sense. If anyone could figure out how to use chakra supression inately it would definitely be a ninja whose specialization deals directly with things in that particular field. 

"Uh. I mean. I know lots of stuff. Is there anything that you're looking for in general? I know like. So much ninjutsu but I have to assume that won't be that helpful. Most of it deals with my bloodline. The rest is like. Suiton? I think I have a couple doton jutsu? DO you do ninjutsu? Is puppetry your only means of defense right now? Oh oh oh oh is there like. Sensory specialzation attacking techniques you can do like, can you sense someone so strong that it stabs them with a....sensory sword? No that probably doesn't make any sense at all huh? Heck. UH. I don't know much lower rank stuff if I'm being honest. Theres just like little things like mark seal and summoning and genjutsu Kai and all the base level stuff every ninja should know. If you need any of that though I totally have your back. OK. Focusing, What specifically are you looking to learn next. If i know it and you point it out then we can go from there. Otherwise i'll just be sitting here for an hour describing every trick in my book. "

(TWC 7516)

Nico did have to say it was impressive she actually managed to take in what he was saying or at least it appeared that way. Nico then heard her idea. Invisible puppets were quite possible. Now that he could make his threads invisible maybe he could use them to transmit the camoflage technique. The idea was quite devastating. If it was possible he could attack with no harm unto himself and his puppets.

"The technique I used if trained more can affect other objects outside of the user. So theoretically I could turn puppets or even allies invisible. Though I'm not sure of a sensory sword I have read into mind reading techniques in the field. I was planning on picking some of those up. The sensory field is quite versatile." Nico thought for a brief moment on the field itself. The skills were not that great for damage but the best skill in a ninjas arsenal was stealth. How would someone defend against a killer that theoretically is undetectable.

"That summoning technique you spoke of could be quite useful would you mind teaching it to me." Nico wanted to be able to summon things. Being able to have less weight on his back would be great for movement, because right now his backpack had everything it could hold and it weighed more than a tailed beast.

"Once I make some more successful puppets the plan was to move towards the medical field. I have recently learnt about some of its many strengths, specifically healing broken limbs." Chuckling and looking down at his arm he simply laughed. The field of medical also had some fields that he wished to experiment into as well. Regeneration being one of those.

"So if you would like to teach me the summoning technique that would be nice."
(TWC 4550)