A pirate lives free [Saya]

"Not really..." Dana answered, then a thought would suddenly strike her, "Actually, oi learned to do this!" She started the sentence by speaking with her normal voice, but the last word would suddenly shift to be identical to Saya's. "Cool, right?" She continued, still speaking in Saya's voice. The most jarring part about the whole thing was probably that Dana had completely lost her accent by using Ventriloquism. It brought up the interesting question of how the technique actually functioned; was it somehow changing her vocal cords? Where did an accent even come from?

"Oh yeah! I also learned this!" Dana excitedly ran back to collect the changing screen and try to hand it back to the twins. If they accepted, Dana would turn back to where she had formed the earth pillar a second ago and do several hand seals: Boar, Ox, Serpent, Snake, and to cap it off Horse. She slammed her palm down on the rocky surface of the beach and then suddenly the entire, previously pretty, beach would begin to shake. Sections of ground in a 30m cube in front of Dana began to rise and then fall, turning around in a way that wasn't dissimilar to a meat grinder. She allowed the Jutsu to fade, but the damage had already been done. In place of the semi-flat serene pebble beach, a collection of huge rocks and torn-up earth took its place. She nodded, that had been fun! She looked to the side and saw that the boat had somehow gotten itself thrown into the sea, curious as to where it had gotten to...

"THE BOAT!" Dana said at the exact same time as Saya, their two identical voices coming together to create a strange harmony. It seemed that using Ventriloquism had also changed Dana's vocal tics and mannerisms to match Saya's; Dana had never shouted in all caps before. She finally dropped the Ventriloquism Jutsu and turned back to Saya when the girl asked if Dana wanted to get on the boat. She nodded excitedly and then her smile turned playful, "Oi'll race ye!"

Without any hesitation, the white-haired Senju would shoot towards the boat at a speed of 70, giggling with glee. Upon reaching the edge of the shoreline, Dana crouched down mid-run and lept towards the edge of the boat. Unfortunately, whilst in mid-air, it would become apparent that she had overestimated her ability to jump long distances. She wasn't going to make it! Dana didn't mind taking a dip in the ocean on occasion, but not while wearing an expensive new outfit her friend had gifted her not moments prior. Just as she was starting to reach the apex of her jump and fall, Dana quickly made two hand seals and two flowers would appear on her palms. She extended her arm outwards and vines would shoot out from them at a speed of 110, managing to hook on to the edge of the boat and pull Dana the rest of the way safely.

WC: 508
TWC: 2626

The twins nodded in unison as Dana's voice shifted to sound like their own. It was a little suprising, though the intrigue didn't show on their faces, that a non puppetry user could learn the ventrilloquism technique, but the pair recognized the shift immediately. Saya had, of course, been using this jutsu nearly constantly for months now in order to give her puppets voices, so it was second nature to see it's use and recognize the technique. "Huh. Ventrilloquism. I actually didn't know a non puppetry ninja could do that, but we evolved past the need for that jutsu a while back." The last line was said in perfect unison between Saya and ai, two voices impossibly coming from the same girl, with one thrown to sound like it was coming from the puppet. The next jutsu was also interesting, but not much of a surprise. When her friend stomped the ground, her mind shifted back to that day in the bar, and she could feel the earth shifting exactly as she'd made it do so long ago. On instinct, though she didn't expect dana to actually let the technique get to her, six small flowers formed on her body without the need for hand seals to activate the chakra. Two spun into creation on the inside of her ankles, and immediately she was lifted up off the ground by the powerful vines as a means of protection. As usual two formed on the inside of each wrist, one just off center of the throat, and one at the tip of her solar plexus.

"Tearing earth turning palm. yanno. If you'd said something I totally could have taught both of those to you the other day. I've got a TON of good jutsu that do various things.... though I suppose we did end up having to part before we got the chance to go over everything I know. Glad you figured it out tho! It's a great jutsu for keeping distance. and also... " As she stopped the statement short, she'd simply point at Ai. The girl now hovered about three inches from the ground, out of the effects of the doton jutsu that had stopped before it could harm them.

As the two shouted in unison, Saya glanced over at her puppets, and realized just how far they'd been able to get. THen a challenge was issued. This didn't seem fair at all. Saya had a much deeper pool of chakra, or at least she thought, and had already activated a jutsu with movement ability. Still, she figured it was meant to be fun, not an actual convorsation and so she'd let Dana get a few steps ahead before the vines pushed her forward at incredible speed. At a speed of one hundred and ten she'd blow past her friend, Taking a leap that was extended as the vines simply pushed into the ground and stretched out to place her gently on the boat.

She almost reached out with another vine when she realized dana wouldn't make it, but just as the jutsu slid from the flower on her wrist, she saw the girl's own jutsu form, and retracted her technique to allow her the chance to show off a little.

"Nice use of Great grasping vines!! "

(TWC 3210)

As Dana's vines pulled her over the side of the boat at a speed of 85, not 110 (Doing any math at 4AM is not advised), she would land like a gymnast on the top of the boat with nary a sound. Both her arms over her head, Dana quickly blew out the breath she'd been holding and then brought her hands down to straighten her coat that had become a bit ruffled during the jump. Now that she was on the boat, Dana had quickly realized that she had absolutely zero clues on how to operate a boat like this. She usually had sudden bursts of unknown-sourced intuition during situations like this, but for once she was left completely in the dark. She did, however, get the sense that she'd know how to sail to a smaller type of boat. Alongside this sense came a pang of sad inexplicable nostalgia. The good mood the day had put her in faltered, but one look at her situation - among friends, having a fun day, a new outfit - her good mood came back stronger.

She'd suddenly look at Saya with a big smile on her face and run over to attempt to give the smaller girl a big hug. There wasn't a particular reason for this; after all, did one ever need a good reason to hug a friend? No, Dana was just suddenly in a really good mood and couldn't contain it. When she broke away from the hug she'd still have a big cheesy smile on her face before looking around the boat once again with a puzzled expression on her face. The boat was big, there was no way they would be able to sail the thing by themself. What they needed was more people. More... Danas.

That was it! She slammed a fist into her open palm and a look of smugness would appear on her face. She'd heard of ninja being able to duplicate themselves before, and had looked into it. She hadn't actually attempted the Jutsu until now, even though she'd known the handseals for quite some time. She'd just never had a reason to do it until now. Dana had used quite a lot of Jutsu in quick succession and was beginning to feel the effects on her chakra supplies - that was something she'd have to work on.

Her hands went through four hand seals: Tiger, Horse, Ram and finally ending on a unique cross-like seal. Remarkably, she got it right first try, and two puffs of smoke would appear beside Dana. Once the smoke dissipated, two identical clones of Dana would be revealed, doing a mock salute.

"Dana reporting fer duty!" They both called out at the same time. They broke down into a fit of giggles and then took a second to admire each other's outfits. It was the first time actually seeing it from a third-person perspective and it only highlighted just how nicely made it was. Dana nodded appreciatively, and the clone on the her right spoke up.

"We look rather dashing, don't we?"

"We sure do, me." The clone on the left responded. They both looked towards Saya, ready for instructions when suddenly Dana-Prime would gasp.

"The others!" She would run to the side of the ship and look down at the ocean to see if she could try and spot Pinochio amongst the waves.

WC: 569
TWC: 3195

Jutsu used/learned: Shadow Clone

"I hate this. I hate everything. Why is she even like this. How did I of all people get stuck with the silly squad..... Its going to take hours to get all of this water out of my wood. This is the worst. Day. Ever." About five meters out, the small pinochio puppet floated on the top of the water, laying on his back. He'd made no move yet to actually get back to the boat, and was whispering quietly to himself about his situation. Slowly, his body began to dip lower and lower, almost inperceptibly as the boyant wood began to soak with water and his chest cavity filled. Saya didn't even notice.

She turned her head to the side in confusion as Dana formed some hand seals. What was she doing?! There was a moment of anticipation as she was surrounded by smoke.... and then there were two danas? No, it was three. huh. This reminded her of something, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it. As her mind flowed through her understanding of ninjutsu, the edge of the boat dipped a few inches, Ai climbing up and onto the deck.

"Wood clone Aya. Its like your wood clone jutsu, just like. Not wood style?" Without true purpose or intent the puppet would form five hand seals: Tiger. Dog. Snake. Dragon. Boar. Instead of a puff of smoke, There was an odd mass of mokuton chakra poured from her arm, pooling at the deck. It would split into to distinct piles of wooden mush, which quickly raised up, forming a humaniod shape before finally color flowed through their form, and two Ai glanced at the three Dana.

"THATS IT!!!! It's like wood clone but like. not I guess. Ai. This is too many people. " Both of the other girls gave Saya a look of disbelief. The boat was a solid twenty meters long. Despite the rediculous suggestion that they wouldn't have room, the two Ai clones shrugged, and their bodies molded downward into the ship itself. For a moment all that was left was two pairs of eyes, and then they seemed to disappear completely.

"OH right. Where's pinochio?" Ai waved at dana, having climbed onto the boat while she was focused on the new jutsu she was working on. Freyja say calmly at the aft, resting her arms on a long oar pointed upwards towards the sky. Then there was coach.

Bless his heart, Coach had been working tirelessly to find a way to get his friend pinochio back. He grasped one of the long masts that had been flipped out with the small puppet, and was pulling each of the vital pieces back into the boat before finally reaching out with the mast to prod the puppet.

"About time. Coach, you're my only true friend." He rolled over, his chest cavity now full of water, and his head dipped under for a moment before small hand grasped the mast, puling himself back up and into the boat.

(TWC 3713)

There it was again, that thing Dana had noticed the twins both seem to do from time to time. From Dana's perspective, Ai had just responded to a question Saya had been having in her head. It was possible that Ai just knew her sister well enough to guess what she'd been thinking, but there had to be something more going on than that. Was Dana missing something completely obvious? The twins had had that freaky moment earlier where they'd both spoken in tandem with each other, claiming to have outgrown the Ventriloquism Jutsu. What did that mean, exactly? Dana wondered what the answer to this conundrum was and then decided that it wasn't her place to try and pry into the business of other people. Saya and her friends were all obviously independent of each other, even Coach, so Dana would continue to think of them as their own people.

The Wood Clone Jutsu was interesting, and something that Dana would make a note of to learn in the future. As it was now, Dana was already struggling to remember all the high-powered Jutsu she had. It was probably an experience - which she lacked - thing, hopefully, as she got more used to being a ninja, her mind would open up to more Jutsu. If she learned any more highly-ranked Jutsu like Wood Clone assumedly was, her brain would probably explode. And that would probably be very painful.

"That's class." She nodded at Ai after she demonstrated the Wood Clone Jutsu, "Any idea how it's different from Shadow Clone?"

Dana would watch Ai's clones sink into the wood of the boat with raised brows but an otherwise passive expression. That had been very cool, and now she was wondering if she could learn to do that with her own body. Something like Hiding Like a Mole but with Wood Release constructs instead of the earth. She was brought out of her thoughts by Ai asking where Pinochio; the white-haired Senju had gotten distracted by thoughts of the future and had completely forgotten to go looking for him like she'd originally set out to do.

She ran up to the side, later than she had intended, and would help Pinochio up over the side of the boat by offering him a hand. Regardless of whether he accepted the extra help, one of Dana's clones would approach him once he was up on the boat and take off her coat to put around his shoulders. She didn't know if a wood-built person could feel cold but at least the clone's coat would help him dry himself. It was why Dana Prime hadn't given the coat; she didn't want it to be ruined.

The real Dana raised a hand to give Pinochio a consolidating pat but then drew it back before the movement became too obvious. He hadn't appreciated her patting his head last time, so she'd refrain from doing it again. Or maybe it was calling him 'little man' which had set him off?

WC: 505
TWC: 3700

"mm. Yanno. We don't actually know regular shadow clone, but I think that Wood style clone is a stronger jutsu? I know they can phase into plant life to hide and you can also use it to make a seed instead of a clone. The seed when ingested or placed on a target allows the user to track them. We needed to build our control over mokuton in order to use more powerful techniques so it just made sense to take Wood style intead of shadow I suppose?" Even as Ai tried her best to explain the differences, There was a gurgling mumble from the side of the boat where Coach was working diligently to save his friend. Pinochio, sensing his knowlege was needed, was trying his best to explain the general difference between the techniques. It succeeded only in creating indecypherable sound of both attempted speech and drowning. Of course he couldn't really drown, but the effect emphasized his mental existence in this world, and subconsciously Saya's skill in ventrilloquism created the auditory illusion that it was a possibility.

"Honestly like. It's really cool BUT i've never actually used it. Maybe I should at some point? It's alot to think about in combat. Theres already like five of us at any given time so I guess adding extra bodies to the battlefield never really registered. " It would be REDICULOUS for our dear protagonist to use wood clones in combat. Can you even imagine?! Counting her summon, and the second one she was told she'd be introduced to soon, that would be 9 bodies on the field. And that's only with her current puppets. No, It was for the best, and for my sanity as a humble third person narrator that she choose not to use that technique.

Finally Pinochio was hoisted up onto the boat, embaraced, soaked completely through, and thoroughly unhappy with the way things turned out. While he didn't argue with the coat wrapped around his body to help warm him up, he gave her a look that said 'don't even think about it' before she had the chance to pat his head. As so often seemed to be the case lately, he would need to take some time to consider how exactly he'd fallen so far. From the brilliant teacher who helped saya achieve greatness to a bit of drift wood floating to sea?! Rediculous.

"Alright team. Let's be off! Pinoch, you're on first position." The sails were set in grooves across the deck, three total, and as they clicked into place there was a sound of scrapping wood from the back of the boat. Freyja was already in position, and began to circle the two oars she'd been resting on, thrusting the craft slowly out from the bank where it was dropped. Coach took the middle position, quickly rotating his own set of oars in the center of the boat, but for now pinochio would choose to sit quietly and not help. He needed some space.

(TWC 4214)

"Sounds like a lot to keep track of." Dana agreed. It hadn't clicked before but Saya's group of friends appeared to be the kind of people who stuck together through everything, including a fight. Dana tried to think of trying to fight that many people at the same time, and then gave up. Sounded like a lot of work and a lot of headaches. Dana didn't even know what was going on around her most of the time in mundane situations, in a fight that complete lack of situational awareness would only compound. Yeah, Dana was happy just being by herself.

Dana let out a little 'eep' sound at Pinochio's glare and withdrew from the wooden boy faster than she is otherwise would have. She didn't usually have any sort of self-preservation instinct but something about his glare had made her react. It was like getting scolded by a teacher when in front of the class; something that went beyond fear. The clone that had given him the coat, however, apparently lacked this survival instinct. When Pinochio went to sit down by himself, she would go and sit go and sit next to him at a somewhat respectable distance to give him the space he wanted.; just consolidating with him. Dana prime and the remaining clone kept an eye on the two to make sure her brazen clone didn't cause any issues.

Dana and Clone-One jumped to attention and saluted, almost knocking their hats off during the motion. They both took their places at separate oars and begin to heave the boat along with the others. It quickly became obvious that the waifish girl had never done any kind of physically demanding exercise like this before, and she was becoming quite tired very quickly. Then she looked up and realized what was going wrong; she was completely out of sync with everyone else on the boat! This meant she was individually trying to power the movement of the boat when she should be working together with everyone else. What could the solution to this be? They were all on separate parts of the boat so not everyone could see everyone, there had to be another way...

Dana began to hum a tune that would probably be familiar to everyone else on the boat, though she hummed so quietly at first that it was barely audible above the sounds of the waves. Then she'd start to gently sing the lyrics, revealing that the young woman actually possessed quite a nice singing voice when she put her mind to it. The song she sang was nice and simple and possessed a good steady rhythm that everyone could row along to. It was simple enough that even people not familiar with the song would pick it up pretty quickly.

"What will we do with a drunken sailor?
What will we do with a drunken sailor?
What will we do with a drunken sailor?
Early in the morning!

Way hay and up she rises
Way hay and up she rises
Way hay and up she rises
Early in the morning!"

And so she'd continue to sing all the verses, loudly enough for everyone to hear. Her clone joined in quickly, and hopefully everyone else would in due time. Dana didn't really get embarrassed but she'd hate to be the only one singing on the boat.

WC: 566
TWC: 4266

Huh. Saya watched her friend salute, confused about what exactly she was....doing? Thankfully Saya knew her well enough to know how rediculous the idea that she would get behind a set of oars would be given that they were ninjutsu users and had very little--wait. what was she? I seem to be mistaken. (sound of shuffling papers) As usual, our protagonist and her friend seem to have gone off script solely to make my job as your humble third person narrator more dificult. This is why I drink.

Despite the puppets working tirelessly, and the obvious implication that the small not so physically inclined girls would not be terribly helpful behind a set of oars, Dana had hopped right in to do her part. Fortunately she could at least help with building up speed a bit as long as she rowed in line with the rest of the team. Unfortunately no one told her this fact, and it would take her some time to realize the necessity of teamwork. These senju girls were a team match made in heaven, or in our case, hell. It would take some time for her to figure out how to effectively help, and the boat slowed significantly as the coach puppt, always one to want to give aid, stopped and started in order to try and sync up his movements with Danas. The puppet had kindness and compassion in spades, but his head was literally filled with rocks. Saya thought it would be helpful to weight it down a bit in case of performance in heavy weather. Then, the magic happened. Starting a scene that could only be possible in a movie, The group began to sing, first with Dana singing quite an old and well known sea shanty, and then Saya, and ai. Coach tried his best, but found his back pack full of plot convenient signs that just happened to have exactly what he might need to say out of reach, and glanced hopefully at Ai to give him a hand.

With a sigh, Ai slid the bag over, and held signs containing the lyrics the group was singing up one by one in time with the start of each line.

"FROM Tortuga's port we put to sea and sailed for sixteen days
In the biggest storm i've ever seen we almost lost our way
when a call came from the deckhand, boy's I think she's going down,
but don't you fear there's enough rum here to DRINK UNTIL WE DROWN"

Saya timed the lines between the choruses Dana had started, recognizing a clear distinction in the two versions of the song they were singing. She would need to introduce her friend to the shanty group she was so fond of one of these days

Saya's version:

"What do we do with a drunken sailor
what do we do with a drunken sailor
what do we do with a drunken sailor
erlie in the mornin
hoo-ray and up she rises
hoo-ray and up she rises
hoo-ray and up she rises
erlie in the mornin!"

(TWC 4724)

"Shave his belly with a rusty razor
Shave his belly with a rusty razor
Shave his belly with a rusty razor
Early in the morning!

Way hay and up she rises
Way hay and up she rises
Way hay and up she rises
Early in the morning!"

Dana and her clone would continue singing the song, and it would quickly become clear that she was familiar with a different version to the others on the boat. The two different lyrics would clash horrendously and end up creating a weird lyrical mess, but the harmonies created would truly be a wonderful spectacle to behold. Everyone on the boat possessed some sort of singing ability so it ended up actually sounding rather professional. Thankfully, despite the differing lyrics, the rhythm remained consistent between everyone on the boat, so the speed of the boat would dramatically speed up once everyone was working in tandem. This was, of course, a little joke. Dana and her clone were actually doing very little even when in time with everyone else, but it was the thought that counted.

The boat sliced through the murky waves of the Island Country like butter, lacking any concrete destination except 'forward'. Water splashed up onto the deck but, thankfully, missed hitting anyone. Dana suddenly had an idea and would let go of the oars for a second. She felt her chakra potency dramatically rise as she called upon the power of her clan, then she did the hand seals for both Great Grasping Vines and the Ninjutsu Amplifier she had been taught by Saya. Two flowers would form on her shoulders, and then a pair of vines would snake down her arms, out of the opening of her sleeves, and start rowing the oars for her at a speed of 160. This time, the shift in the speed of the boat was actually noticeable, and Dana had a chance to relax.

She looked behind her at Clone-One who appeared to be sulking that she couldn't cheat as Dana Prime had just started doing. The clone saw her creator looking so she sarcastically let go of the oars and stuck her tongue out at the original, to which Dana Prime just raised a brow. Was she being sassed by her own clones? Why was that a thing they could do? It wasn't like she could clap back either because that would just be weird. Responding to sass with more sass was never a good idea; it just led to a large compounding perpetual-motion machine in which things just got worse and worse.

Eventually, Dana's song would wind down to a close and she decided to take a small break from rowing. The vines unwound themselves from the oars and retreated back into the sleeves of Dana's coat. She stood up and stretched, looking behind her to see how far they'd gotten from the Island. They'd gotten decently far, enough that nearly the entire island could be covered by a palm if she held it up in front of her. Dana decided to skip to the front of the boat to look out across the ocean, trying to see if she could see anything across the horizon. Was the place where she came from somewhere out there? She'd woken up on the shores of Kirigakure, among the wreckages of the boat.

Alas, today wasn't the day to be dwelling on such matters. What she was dwelling on now, however, was how hungry she had gotten doing all that rowing. "Ye wouldn't happen to have snacks would'ya? Oi've gotten rather peckish."

WC: 600
TWC: 4866

Jutsu used: Trifle of the Senju, Great Grasping Vines, Ninjutsu Amplifier

"The deck hand took a barrel broke the seal and took a swig
and soon their screams turned into songs their panic work turned into jigs
the first mate bellowed orders ever trying to save their skin,
any drunken wretch the captain catch'll be torn limb from limb

What do we do with a drunken sailor
what do we do with a drunken sailor
what do we do with a drunken sailor
erlie in the mornin"

The group continued their song with jubliation. It was... A mess. The two sets of singers were in time with one another, coach getting about a line behind the rest of team puppet as Ai mixed up his 'sing a song specifically with Dana while on a boat in the middle of the afternoon' set of signs with his 'casual responses to how his day was going' set of signs, causing her to respond momentarily to a line with "looks like rain" before she shuffled through the set again to find the right ones. From then on she was just far enough behind to have thrown coach's whole groove off, but honestly he was just so happy to participate that his spirits weren't too broken.

With the song over, Saya burst into laughter, dropping to the floor of the boat for several minutes as the rest of her team, save her sister, continued to row as she rolled about in glee, and then It was serious time. Now that they were out from the sea shelf, The winds picked up. That was great, because it would save her team on physical exertion, but meant she needed to harness this ability. IN an instant she was up, one palm placed against the boat to vault upwards in a hand stand that sent her flying back to her feet.

Like an acrobat she simply placed her feet down on the deck as her body shifted from upside down to right side up, and before she'd even solidified her footing she was off again. At a run she lept at the first sail. Practiced precision landed one arm and both feet against the mast, and as she shimmied up two steps she pulled a string that released the lavender sail. Without even considering that it would be rational to simply walk to the next she vaulted once more, floating through the air to catch on the base of the second sail. One more set of aerial maneuvers released the last two sails, and as she landed on the ground the wind swept them up, and they were flying towards the horizon.

"mmmm Probably? Ai can you check for snacks?" There is a very specific point in Saya's history that will tip off any long time listeners as to what would happen next. Ai dropped the sign in her hand, which simply said "of course" and was pointed towards Dana after her question, and climbed the Coach puppet in three steps. The hatch on his back opened, And from it she pulled a white bag with large clear containers in it. Of course she'd brought mappo tofu.

(TWC 5243)