Goemon stretches his arms over his head and lets out a yawn.
After the first day of just assessing the new trainees, Goemon was laying out what he needed to work on with both of them. Yakeru was gonna need to learn to control how much power he uses when it comes to his fire ability. It would be dangerous if he weren't able to stop the fire quick enough before it went out of control and killed someone. And Fuyuko needs to calm down when it comes to working on her ability. She concentrates too much on just forming anything that it doesn't wrap around that she is trying too hard and can really hurt someone if they get too close.
"Goemon." Goemon looks back and finds Kotaro entering his room.
"Hey,"
"How did today go?"
Kotaro sits down next to Goemon and finds the journal with notes in it sitting on the desk in front of them.
"It was as eventful as I expected it to be. I assessed their abilities and the level of their current training and I'm honestly surprised that they are even just junior trainees. I've seen amateurs with better training than them." Goemon explains with a shake of his head.
"Yakeru started a little late but Fuyuko grew up in the clan. I'll admit, we don't have the best training, but we did what we could when we found out that she did have such ability." Kotaro clears to the redhead.
"About that: how is she able to have such abilities? You only knew a few techniques and really most were water-related, not really wind-related." Goemon asks.
"The name Fuma means 'wind demon'. Why wouldn't she have the ability to manipulate it?" Kotaro asked sarcastically, raising an eyebrow in amusement.
"Really?"
"OR… they say when someone has a technique that is favored, their child would bear a similar ability," Kotaro says as he softens his gaze. "It doesn't bother me that she was gifted such an ability. I just want her to be safe with it. And you are the only one I can trust to handle it."
Goemon blushes a bit and remembers the image of Fuyuko from earlier that day. They really were similar: it was kinda scary.
"Yeah yeah, I understand perfectly. Though I was pretty much dragged into it without my own will."
Kotaro chuckles a bit at his curt comment. That was definitely his old friend.
"Momo and I are heading to the tea house. Want to join?" Kotaro asks his friend as he stands up and turns towards the exit of the room.
"Hell yeah, I need a drink after today." Goemon eagerly stands from the ground and quickly slips on his sandals as he follows Kotaro out of the room.
As he follows the albino, Goemon notices one of the rooms had a door ajar and tries to remember who was staying in the room. Opening the sliding door just wide enough to be able to peek in, he finds Yakeru and Fuyuko in complementary colored yukatas and sharing a futon. They faced each other and Fuyuko used Yakeru's arm as a pillow with his fingers resting between the white strands of her hair.
The two were fast asleep and looked exhausted from the day's training. Goemon could only smile at the scene before shutting the door all the way and catching up to his friend.
~PYRODYNASTY~
Goemon downs a cup of sake and lets out a sigh of relief.
"Much needed."
"I see your first day of training was a success." Momo hums as he grabs the bowl of soba noodles and slurps them up.
"It was pretty much just a day of assessing their abilities. Tomorrow, we are getting down to the basics. Square fucking one." Goemon says as he pours himself another cup of sake.
"And Yakeru?"
"What about him?"
Momo slurps more of the noodles before eyeing his friend.
"Is he mini you?" He jokes.
"If I said yes, will you stop talking?"
Goemon glares at his childhood friend before taking another swig of sake.
"You love me."
"Well look who it is." Musashi suddenly appears near the group with a bowl of ramen in his hands. He looked to be heading to an open table but got distracted by the familiar group of ninjas.
"Musashi." Kotaro greets with a bow before going back to the book he was reading in silence.
"Hey, Sashi! Join us!" Momo greets, tapping the seat next to him.
Musashi rolls his eyes, sitting down next to the ninja he was acquainted with.
"So how are the new trainees?"
"You'll never believe it but apparently one of them is his son!" Momo reveals with some excitement, Musashi pausing his movements for a moment before looking over at the redhead.
"Ironic, ain't it?" A smirk appears on his lips and he raises an eyebrow.
Momo glances back and forth between Musashi and Goemon, confused about what they were talking about.
"Shut the hell up, Musashi." Goemon bites.
"Ooh. Drama." Momo hums.
Goemon glared at Momo, telling him visually to shut up.
"Just a few days ago, Goemon was having a meltdown about not knowing how to handle some new trainees. And I bet looking back now, he shouldn't have worried too much about it." Musashi implies with a smile, taking a slurp of the ramen in front of him.
"Didn't you adopt one of your apprentices a little while back?" Kotaro mentions, keeping his eyes down at his book before taking a sip of his green tea.
"Yup. He ran away from home and tried to steal for a living before I found him and took him in." Musashi tells the group as he takes a bite of the soft-boiled egg from his ramen.
"Why adopt him then?" Goemon asks, raising an eyebrow.
"Why wouldn't I? He's a nice kid and learned how to use swords pretty quick." Musashi nods his head, remembering the first day he met the kid; when he tried to pickpocket him.
"There's a banquet going on tomorrow night at the Hattori mansion if you want to join us with your kid," Momo mentions the ronin, giving him a nudge on his elbow.
"Yeah, I'll ask him if he's interested in joining. He's a little bit of an introvert so maybe he might skip."
"Him and I both." Goemon sighs, taking another drink of sake; except from the bottle and not the cup.
~PYRODYNASTY~
The crescent moon glowed high in the sky when Goemon decided to head back to the mansion.
If he was going to be training these kids for who knows how long, he was going to have to move around and figure out a different living situation. He couldn't stay in the Hattori guest room forever. He could either go back to Iga and take the two trainees with him, or move to a neighboring city that is between Iga, Ise, and the Fuma Clan. There were a couple but he wouldn't know what was currently safe to live in at the moment and if the trainees would agree to leave such a place.
"Goemon-sensei." Goemon is pulled out of his train of thought by a familiar voice.
Looking up, he finds Yakeru sitting on the porch of the courtyard facing the night sky with a cup of tea in his hands.
"What did I tell you guys about calling me sensei?" Goemon shook his head and walked over next to the kid. "Calling me by my name is just fine. No need for formalities."
"Just trying to show some respect at least." Yakeru huffs as he looks away from the ninja and towards the moon.
"So what are you doing up?" He asks, sitting on the porch and staring in the same direction.
"I have issues sleeping. Sometimes I would wake up in the middle of the night and just be fully awake like I didn't just sleep half the evening, then have a hard time going back to sleep." Yakeru explains, going for a sip of tea before blowing on it as it was still pretty hot.
Goemon could only let out a hum as he continued to gaze at the pale moon, then following a shooting star that passed just below it.
"Hanzo will be having a small banquet tomorrow evening if you're interested in joining. It's small, but it will have some of the neighboring headmen and politicians joining that you could meet." Goemon brings up, glancing at the kid at the corner of his eye and seeing his nonchalant reaction.
Yakeru shrugs. "Maybe."
It falls silent again between the two fire ninjas for a few minutes before Goemon lets out a yawn. Stretching, he stood from the porch and told the kid good night before his voice stopped him.
"Do I really use too much power?"
Goemon was barely able to hear him but the question really caught him off guard. During the assessment, Yakeru argued that it didn't matter that he used too much, and the more the better.
"It may not seem like it would happen, but you could hurt yourself just as much as you can hurt others around you if you aren't able to control your abilities," Goemon explains in a gentle voice.
A sudden flashback took Yakeru back to when he was just a little boy. He remembers the first time he went out of control. Nearly killed a boy who was a few years older than him. Then flashes of burns on his mother's hands made him wince, guilt welling up inside him.
"I want to help you as much as I can. So please, don't fight me." Yakeru stays silent. "See you in the morning."
Yakeru heard Goemon's footsteps disappear and he is once again surrounded by silence. He watches the shooting stars fly across the sky before bringing up his cup to take a sip of tea, only to be surprised by how cold it got in just a few minutes.
