Chapter 3
"I think we have enough firewood, though I worry that when we get to the desert the night will freeze us to death."
Jynx stacked the firewood in a neat pile next to the dying embers of last nights fire. Kyo glanced at the boys as they went about their nightly warm-up. Lately she had been training the children night and day until they were too tired to stand. Except they kept on standing, or at least getting up, Kyo mused. Wolf had clawed up the tree ferociously until he had reached the top, grinning triumphantly. After a private conversation with her little brother, Kaneda slowly but surely had made his way up the tree. And Jynx had taken it upon herself to climb up and down till she really did fall. Kyo had had a nasty scare when her young charge had just toppled out of the treetops unconscious, before the boys had rushed to catch her. Who landed on who was still a mystery, but all had crashed into a jumbled gennin pile.
Wolf snarled as he ravaged the tree once again. Were it not for the healing powers of this forest, she thought, there would have been a clear path of barkless trees in their wake. This young Daruna showed all the ferocity that his clan was so famous for.
"If you put that kind of energy into your studies, little brother, you could probably have passed years ago." Kyo called out to the sleeping form of her sibling.
"No...challenge," Kaneda yawned. "Too...easy...for...effort." Wolf took this opportunity to pounce on his teammate, instigating another one of the never-ending tussles this team seemed to have.
"You don't seem to understand, brother, that your teammates will surpass you in a matter of days if you don't start working harder." The faintest expression of horror passed Kaneda's face as he leapt out of the wrestling match, which red-eye seemed to have joined, and bolted for the trees. Wolf, suddenly with new energy, followed.
Kyo caught sight of one of Jynx's rare smiles and pursed her lips. Kyo knew that her team was probably far above the norm for age when it came to skills, and there teamwork in battle wasn't poor at all, but... they weren't communicating as they should. In fact, she thought, they seemed to growing separately, instead of intertwining. She knew her brother had his own burdens to bear, and that Jynx... well, Kyo leaned forward to give her students shoulder a comforting squeeze, but like always she flinched away.
"S...sorry sensei. I'm...I'm...all covered in soot! Wouldn't want to get you dirty, Sensei." With a weak smile and a polite bow, Jynx scurried over to the other side of the fire. Kyo sighed, leaned back, and contemplated what means would be required to get her team to properly bond.
Jynx flinched as a profoundly conniving look passed her teachers face. The smile on Kyo's face always meant she was going to up their training or torture, which really amounted to the same thing.
E: well! That's another chapter done! What is Kyo's training? Feel free to take guesses. Next: More Training? What's this? An Old Enemy?
B: Have to agree with N! But really Kyo's going to quite mean in this new training! Have fun learning just how mean she really is!
