Cat scratch fever mission [D Rank]

[Guyviroth]

SPOILER: Click to show

☆ Name: Cat Scratch Fever
Rank: D
Repeatable: Yes
Description: Little Ayane has gone missing yet again. Lady Haruni can't seem to keep her in one place. Normally this would be considered important. However Ayane isn't a child, but rather, a cat that likes to run away from time to time and venture the village.
Obective: Catch Ayane and bring her back to the client.
Reward: 25 EXP and 500 Ryo

The midday glow of the shimmer of gold seemed to sparkle elegantly over the top of the village, although it seemed as though the veil of sunshine was just a masquerade to hide what was truly an awful day out in the village. Everyone seemed to be quiet, no chatting amongst the villagers, not even so much as a smile to one another. In fact, some of the people who roamed the village grounds had their heads hung low almost in disdain. But what could they possibly be unhappy about on such a great day like this?

"OOOOHHHHHHHHH!" What an awful yell that was, coming from the Hokage's office. It was almost like the sound of a beached whale choking on a pineapple. "My Ayane! Where could she be! Oh tell me you know where she is, sir? Have you found her!?" The jounin accompanying her was almost too afraid to say anything out of turn that may offend her. Instead, he assured her that they had their best Genin on the job. It was no wonder that the villagers were miserable today, having Lady Haruni bellowing her voice like that to echo throughout the village wallers. It must of been unbearable for the Jounin standing next to her even more so.

The voice was more than enough to keep Helios awake too. Despite it being midday with no one around to help assist in the mission, the young boy had no choice but to accept the mission to keep the old hag at bay for at least another 24 hours, despite it feeling so... underneath him. That, and Helios wanted to get into this new board game he discovered at an old antiques shop for cheap. Something called "Chess" that played rather similar to Shogi. But of course, with the voice of the coming end booming through the village it was hard to concentrate. Helios rose reluctantly, stretching his arms to his side and sighing. "I guess i'd better go see what the fuss is about..."

[Guyviroth]

The walk to the Hokage's office was seemingly much shorter than the route to the hospital district was. But then again, it was simply one set, straight path to the building, to which stuck out like a sore thumb either way. It was more of a hassle trying to get up the steps to the office than it was just walking to the building itself. And to be fair, Helios was feeling way too lazy and demotivated to do this mission anyway. He planned to relax after the completion of this petty assignment anyway with some good light reading of the rulebook for Chess, though the more he thought about it, the more it seemed like just a less complicated version of Shogi. Maybe Chess was derived from Shogi? or maybe Shogi was just a more complex remake of Chess? The more he seemed to think about the implications of the two game's relativity the more he wanted to just set up a game and play it himself.

Well, it seemed all that thinking ended up making the time of day flow right past Helios' face; before he knew it, he was already at the top floor to where the mission board was and, beyond the door of strife lied the heart of madness, Lady Haruni. Helios could feel a lump in his throat rise from the pit of his stomach; he was nervous to knock on the door, simply because he didn't want to be within 100 yards of her big mouth, let alone in the same room as it. It was almost a mix of overwhelming terror and perpetual nervousness. However, manning up, he took a deep breath, and was about to tap two knuckles on the door. "OOOHHHHH! Why hasn't anyone found her yet! It's been five minutes since you assured me!" Whatever confidence he had in walking through that door had now been sucked out of him by the sound of the woman's hallowed cry. Quickly, Helios regained composure, placing a hand on the handle and just charging in, head first, disregarding the need of courtesy or even the fact that he was about to land ass over head in a heap of misfortune.

"Oh my Lord," Lady Haruni bellowed in a loud, obnoxious cry, turning to see the young, pale-skinned boy with the daunting look on his face. "It's a ZOMBIE! Quick, shinobi, stay in front! Protect me! Throw one of those throwing knife things at his head and kill him for good!" The jounin couldn't help but sigh, and shifted to one side, allowing both Helios and Lady Haruni a chance to look at one another. Lady Aruni was a rather short and stocky woman, probably in her fourties if not slightly older, he hair purmed and tied into a large bunch at the back of her head, cascaded by her small hat, wearing a long, purple, blue and shades in between kimoni with a white floral pattern adhorned all over. Seemed pretty expensive too. "A-are you sure he's the one? He looks awfully sick, doesn't he?" Lady Haruni's voice began to settle now that she wasn't screaming about her woes of how helios looked like he was about to munch on her brain. At least whatever was left of it.

"This is how I usually look, so get used to it," Helios snapped back at her. It wasn't as though he wasn't used to such remarks but considering it came from this overweight, pompous wench she was really starting to take the cake. The look on her shocked face was priceless that Helios just wished he could take a picture of it to use as a medium to make him chuckle if he was ever down. Before Lady Haruni could even so much as retort, Helios overlapped her words with his own. "Regardless, I'm here to pick up your assignment. Sir, if you may hand me the briefing?" The jouning complied with a simple nod, handing over to Helios a sheet of paper that contained all the necessary information it required; description, objective, rewards. Because this was a rescue mission, a picture was provided. Helios' eyes glazed over, before looking up at the Jounin. "... Please tell me that this picture was mixed in the records..." A simple look at the Jounin's face, a shake of the head with a crimpled smirk almost ready to burst with laughter gave the indication that, no, this was the mission. Now Helios knew what it was like to make a face only a picture could capture. "You've got to be kidding me? A cat? This mission is about retrieving a feline?"

"YES!" Lady Haruni bellowed, which caused Helios to slightly hunch his head forwards in reaction to her eardrum-piercing screach. "Ayane means the world to me! But she's always disappearing into the streets all on her lonesome self! Oh what would I do without my Ayaneeeeee!" The woman pulled out a prior-drenched napkin and began to sob lightly into it. Was this woman for real? Crying because a cat does... well, what a cat does?

"Okay, I'll go rescue your... "Ayane" for you. I'll be back in a moment." The woman seemed to cheer up at long last, but Helios didn't want to be around her voice any longer, instead quickly stepping out of the office and shutting the door behind him as quick as he could. "Besides, how hard can capturing a little cat be?"

[Guyviroth]

Back onto the streets of the hidden leaf, Helios began to think of exactly where a cat could be. He had thought about things while he was descending from the hokage's tower, but now that he'd actually started to find a lead he was stumped. The only thing he could think of was that cats usually like to find themselves in alleyways near discarded leftovers, but that was for stray cats, wasn't it? I doubt a cat like Ayane, owned by the seemingly wealthy Lady Haruni would steep so low as to be easting discarded leftovers from other people's trash. On top of that, it would take Helios far too long to check each and every single alleyway within the konoha compound. Least of all that wiould also been searching through the Hyuuga and Uchiha complex' too, and Helios didn't think he was allowed to do such a thing freely. That and he couldn't be bothered to get into permission affairs with the leaders of each clan. Instead, he thought of just dealing with this case like he would with dealing with a missing child; questioning the client and then trying to gather information. Unfortunately, the client happened to be Lady Big-mouth, so that was out the window straight away. So instead, Helios decided to gather whatever information he could from the villagers.

The best bet would be to ask around near the village's central area; a lot of people come and go by from here from various routes, including backstreets and alleyways, so surely one of them would be able to assist Helios in his mission. As he got there though, he noticed a lot of the townsfolk were still on edge from the voice of Lady Haruni. Perhaps it would be difficult to question the people in this state, so he approached them calmly as he could. Turning to one man, helios took out the picture of Ayane to be used to give people the impression he was working on retrieving her. Approaching a rather short man, unkempt short hair and a stubble along his chin, he cleared his voice. "Excuse me, sir," Diligently, the man turned his head to the rather pale young lad, who then held out his right hand with a photo of a small, black cat with a pink ribbon adorned onto the fur of her little head. "I was wondering if you'd seen the cat in this picture? Ayane is her name."

"... If only I wish I'd seen her, then maybe that load of hot air would stay quiet for a while," the man said rather loudly as though he was initiating some sort of threat directed at Helios, giving the impression that Helios was just fooling around, inspiring false hope into the village's people. "Listen, I know you're trying to help but don'tt ake this the wrong way; this task you're doing, it's pointless. That little puffball in the photo is always running around, and Lady Haruni is always worried about her. Who knows how long this's been going on for, and yet she's always so worked up over that pet of hers. I mean, it's a cat, right? Cats are always going out of homes and wandering the streets. That's just... y'know, how they roll."

Helios sighed and nodded, appreciative of the concern but wasn't able to get any information out of the man. It was true though; this did seem like such a lousy mission to do, but it was a mission nonetheless for the citizens of the village. Even if that moment's reprieve was but a single day, that'd be a single day less spent wallowing in misery. That, and this was more of a personal matter for Helios too, seeing as he was also affected by the tundra of sound that eminatted from his ladyship's flaps. But, it seemed as though no one had seen the cat all day. Perhaps this was turning into a serious situation, and that Ayane was not just missing. Perhaps she was kidnapped for ransom? I mean the Hokage wouldn't of known any the wiser, hence why the rank was so low. Or maybe the cat was... killed?

"Hey! You, over here!" A young girl seemed to call out, and with making a turn, Helios noticed that she was staring at him, waving her hand through the air. The girl couldn't of been more than eight years of age, what with that innocent smile of hers. Dressed in a long pink dress with light, platinum blonde hair in a ponytail, she beckoned Helios to her. With a comply, Helios walked over to the young girl, who happened to be holding a small pink ribbon. "You're looking for the old lady's cat, right? I tried to catch her myself but, I was only able to get this ribbon..." Helios looked down as she held out the ribbon as a gesture for Helios to take it. Grasping it, it felt like such soft silk. Must of been worth a lot. Saying that, it must definitely belong to Ayane. "I know the people her are unhappy because the lady keeps shouting, so I'll let you in on a secret, okay? I saw her cat run through here, down that alleyway. Good luck too, she's really quick!" The girl pointed to a small alleyway behind her that seemed to lead down a series on intersections. Still, if it was a lead, he was going to take it. Thanking the girl for her help, Helios headed down the alleyway quickly.

[Guyviroth]

Dark, damp, and smelled like days-old garbage. Well, then again, that's what the main smell of an alley normally is, what with people's garbage festering against the stone walls and metal fences. It was definitely time for Helios to use some of that training and put it to good use. Almost in a complete zen state of mind, Helios began to relax his body, slowing his breathing so that he would be able to tolerate the stank of the alleyway that much more, and began to slow down his own heartbeat. From this, Helios couldn't detect the slightest of sounds much easier. Scanning the area with his eyes, shifting around to the trees above, to the nooks and crannies of the alleyway and the intersection, to the various garbage bags that littered the area. But he couldn't see or notice anything slight, as though it was just vacant. It seemed as though the lead wasn't going anywhere.

"Nyah~" Suddnly, from behind to the side of Helios he could hear a rather faint sound. High pitched, almost squeaky. Turning to see slowly, he saw a small black cat with a pink bow on its head nestled in one of the tree branches overhead. It seemed in Helios' dash to the alleyway he completely overlooked the surroundings beforehand. "Nyahhhhh~" It seemed that the cat was quite comfortable amongst the branches too, using a bundle of leaves as a make-shift covering to rest its body. Still, something was odd about this cat.

Helios took out the small pink bow, looking at it carefully before shifting his head up to the cat that laid among the canopies, watching it as it gazed back to him, and then looked back at the bow again, examinining it fully. It was no mistaking it; it was a silk pink ribbon, just like the one in the photo. Using the photo as a cross-reference, he looked at the bow on the cat's head in the picture. The bow on the cat and the picture were identical. "I don't understand. This cat is wearing a bow like in the photo... but I have the bow right here." It was definitely odd for Helios, almost to the point that he just couldn't figure it out. However, suddenly something clicked in his mind. Holding up the bow in front of his eyes, while keeping the cat in his sight, he noticed the bow was much smaller. The cat seemed to following the bow with its head as Helios raised his hand. "Unless... Ayane has a second bow?" It was unfortunate but the picture only showed Ayane's head and half of her body. Perhaps the bow was adorned to her tail.

The cat gave off a little yawn, showing off its pearly white fangs and sharp claws within its paws, stretching out its front legs infront of itself along the branches before hopping down to the other side of a tall chain-linked fence and running off. "Oh god damnit..." Helios curse to himself and hand to give chase. Fortunately he was quick on his feet and ended up taking a running leap a top of the fence; it was sturdy enough to take his own small weight so it had little chance of buckling under the load. Hopping into the tree, and then onto the rooftop of the building several meters in front of him, Helios began to scout the area, quickly keeping a lock onto Ayane as she scampered through the coutyards of the various buildings. Taking off with a quick sprint, Helios began to jump from rooftop to rooftop like... well, like a ninja, keeping his eye of Ayane. However, she was very nimble, so it would be difficult to catch her with conventional methods.

Helios decided to give chase on ground level, jumping off of the last building and nearly cutting up Ayane has she not ducked into another alleyway. As Helios turned the corner, he couldn't see her body, as though she turned to thin air. The sun was beginning to rise to the west, but as that came to fruition the sun began to shien down the alleyway, giving off a series of shadows; some of bags, one of Helios, and then one rather short one that was shaped like a cat began to appear on the wall at the far side. Helios noticed that Ayane was trying to hide amongst some of the bags and decided to play a little trick. using his Hyouton, Helios created a small tile using Tobihaneru. Slowly he began to move it through the air above the cat. Unnoticed, Helios quickly let loose of the chakra within the ice, suddenly turning into a torrent of water and drenching Ayane, causing her to jump so high she ended up jumping over the bags and into Helios' field of vision. Quickly with a single handsign, the water around the joints of the legs began to freeze. Suddenly, Ayane was unable to move her legs, causing her to panic and fall over. Quickly running up to her, Helios grabbed her by her waist and held her close and releasing the ice from her to avoid any harm that could be brought from using the ice.

"yeah you were quick, and you were smart," helios praised, before smirking and taunting the poor soaked feline. "But I'm just simply better. Now, let's return you to your owner.

[Guyviroth]

Thankfully it wasn't too much effort getting back into the main square and then directly to the Hokage's tower. Along the way it seemed like all the villagers were happy that Ayane was recaptured, and it quick time too although Helios did have an edge above other ninja. The majority of villagers gave off a sigh of relief once they had seen that the little black cat was in someone's hands, as the sooner her return the better it would be for the villager's lives. Some of them were trying to hold bad incourteous laughter as they saw the drenched rodent trying to struggle out of the young boy's arms, to which part of his sleeve was beginning to get tangled into the kitty's legs, much to its own disdain.

However, Helios was beginning to wonder if the mission would of been so successful had it not been for his Hyouton. At least he was greatful for that much, but he still wanted to train his body more so than he wanted to train his chakra. He didn't want to feel like that he had to rely solely on his own energy, and wanted to make himself, his own body, into a lethal weapon that can only break when he dies. He knew much too well whilst studying that chakra can deplete rapidly, especially for Kekkei Genkai users, and that once his chakra was considerably low he would feel too fatigued to be able to carry on the fight. It was the whole reason why he began to take up Kenjutsu in the first place.

Helios arrived at the Hokage's door, and once about to walk it after gripping the handle until what filled ears was something he wished he wasn't going to hear for a long time. "OOOHHHHHH! My sweet, sweeeeeet Ayaneeee! Why hasn't that boy come back yet!? I told you he wasn't up for the job; he should of been in bed resting his head, but NOOOOO you had to go get some sick little kid to get my Ayane! What if he gives her his cold!? OHHHHHH!" Helios wished that he could just leave the cat at the doorstep and knock twice then run away, but somehow he didn't think Ayane was in a sitting mood.

Without further delay, Helios walked into the Hokage's office, watching as the jounin and Lady Haruni turned to see Helios clutching a struggling, soaking wet cat in the sleeve of his kimono. Once again, the lady's face was in absolute shock horror watching as her little Ayane looked like a washed-up ragdool. "Oh my Lord," she started, raising her voice with each pressing word as though she was goign to explode should she speak any more. "What has he DONE TO YOUUUUU!?" She quickly rushed to Helios, with great speed that surprised even the Jounin considering her figure. Snatching the cat away from Helios she cradled her Ayane in her wide arms, snuggling up to her. The jounin, however, couldn't stop laughing, holding his sides and hunched over with hysteria. Helios wasn't to laugh as well, but then he saw the look on Haruni's face. With a dark gleem in her eye she quickly turned around and thrust her hand into the jounin's chest, blasting him across the room and tumbling to the neary wall. "How... DARE you laugh at my little Ayane!" She then turned to Helios, but before she could raise a curse word at him, he had already walked past her.

"Keep my posted on my reward. Mission accomplished." Helios looked down at the Jounin as he directed those words. Taking out the contract he was given earlier, he placed it upon the top of the desk before turning away. Looking at Lady Haruni, she was still seething, but she didn't seem to notice the missing ribbon from Ayane. So, Helios looked into his pocket again before taking out a small pink ribbon and handing it over to Haruni, instinctively holding out her hand to take it. She seemed much more cheerful now that she was holding something that looked like it cost her an arm and a leg. "I think this belongs to you. take care. Haruni lightly held the ribbon between her thumb and forefinger as Helios left the room, closing the door behind him. Sighing, he shook his head and began to walk back down to the village from the steps. "I guess that's what Chess players call "Checkmate"."

EXIT

[Messatsu!]

+47

EDIT: x2 Birthday exp Rewarded