Kori scrunched up her forehead as she focused on getting the final stroke of the royal purple polish just right on her nail, silently vowing to herself that she'd get through training tomorrow without a chip in them. The girl to her left chuckled and Kori quirked an eyebrow at her, her own lips twitching automatically in response. "What?"
Rin laughed again and blew slightly on her still damp hot pink nails. "You just look so serious. It's only nail polish, you know. Nothing drastic will happen if you mess it up." The blonde looked over at her cousin blandly, matching white eyes meeting and teasing each other. The girl that sat in front of the other two girls sighed and flopped back on the small pile of pillows that had been strategically placed on the floor.
"You know, I don't see why we are wasting our time painting our nails. We're ninjas, it'll come off during training." Though the white haired girl had to admit that her now hunter green toes did look dainty and cute, just like the bottle had promised. Kori looked at her best friend exasperatedly and carefully kicked her, making sure not to mess up her nails.
"Karin, shut-up and enjoy girl time. We never get to have it anymore, what with me getting more missions and you two getting settled into your team." Karin rolled her mint green eyes at her older friend, but had to agree, though she did have a few choice words to give, now that Kori had brought it up.
"God, I hate it! All we do is stupid missions like painting fences or helping keep a store. And that cat! Madam Shijimi's cursed cat! I swear, if she wants to keep it with her she needs to put it on a leash, because if that thing claws me again, I'll kill it."
"Wait, it's still alive?"
"I know! I mean, it was alive when our parents were Genin!"
"I feel sorry for it. I mean, it has to deal with Shijimi, and the fact that it seems to be immortal."
"What God would hate anything so much that it would make it deal with that, and not be able to die?"
"Maybe it was a mass murderer in a past life, or a rapist."
"Or an overemotional old lady who sent helpless ninjas to catch her psychotic runaway cat."
The three kunoichi looked at each other and shared a single amused look that communicated everything far better than words could even dare to, a look that only good friends who understood everything about one another could share. Overwhelmingly amused, the three girls started laughing, wiping away the tears that came along with their mirth.
"Well, I guess it's going well." The girls looked up and the pale-haired girl beamed.
"Daddy! You're home!" Looking worn and quite a bit dirty, the famous copy ninja smiled down at his daughter, though the crinkling of a single eye was the only sign of it.
"How was your mission?"
"Fine." He said, easily hiding his tiredness from his eldest child. "Your mother wanted me to bring this up to you." He said as her sat a tray of drinks and snacks down in the middle of them. The girls said their thanks and watched as he walked out.
"Hey, do you think your father had to go after the cat when he was a Genin?" Rin teased, and Kori giggled. Karin felt her own lips twitch, though she was quick to leap to her father's defense.
"Hey! He's not old!" At the other girls' bland looks, Karin felt her face flush. "Forty-eight isn't that old." The cousins giggled and Karin sighed, grabbing one of the glasses of lemonade from the tray and quickly taking a sip. Seeing her pout, Rin grinned and crawled over to her team mate, throwing her arm around her shoulder companionably.
"Hey now! You know, I heard my mom and dad talking about something very interesting earlier." A true gossip at heart, Karin's ears perked.
"Oh?" The brunette grinned and nodded, knowing that she had her hooked.
"Do you know Takara Kei?" Karin narrowed her eyes for a moment, recalling a boy a year or so older than her with a nice face and a bright smile, though he had always seemed a bit too pretty for her tastes.
"Yes."
"He knocked up Otoka Risa." Karin gasped, her hand flying up to her mouth as she remembered the small girl who had graduated from their class.
"No!"
Rin nodded, lips pursed. "Yep."
Kori leaned forward, forehead scrunched up as she remembered something. "I heard that he got her older sister, Shiori, pregnant though." Rin looked over at her and nodded slowly, causing the two girls to gasp.
"Both of them?" Karin leaned back as she thought over this, her earlier annoyance long forgotten. "Isn't their dad an ex-ANBU?" She waited for them to give an affirming nod. "God... He's going to die." The other two girls nodded and they all reached for a cookie and a pillow, getting comfortable for the upcoming conversation.
"Yuki and Yuka broke into the Yondaime's library again."
Rin nibbled on her cookie and raised her eyebrow. "Again? How did they get past the guards this time?"
Kori roughly sighed and shook her head exasperatedly at her younger sisters' antics. "I don't know, but I think it's really starting to hurt the ANBU's egos a bit."
"They're the children of the Hokage. It's expected for them to be better than most." Kori shot her best friend an amused look.
"Yes, but they're nine, Karin. They shouldn't be able to sneak past a whole ANBU guard."
"How long did it take them to get noticed this time?" Kori shrugged and crossed her legs so that she sat Indian style. "A few hours. Yuki figured out some sealing technique and got a little too excited, and they heard her pen when she started taking down notes. Mom's pretty upset since they were banned from going there and everything, but I think Dad is more amused than anything." There were a few chuckles over this, and then Rin sighed.
"My dad is pushing for me to start using the gentle fist more in fights."
Kori snorted. "No offense, but you kind of suck at it."
Rin glared at her cousin, more than well aware of her shortcomings with her father's fighting style. "Not as bad as you, Blondie." Kori snorted again and waved the insult away, uncaring.
"I know. That's why I don't use it."
Karin looked at her team mate, trying to puzzle the situation out. "He knows you can't use it and that you fight perfectly well with your sword. Why would he be trying to change you?"
"I think he has been getting some pressure from the elder council to get me to use it a bit more. You know, endorse the wonder that is Hyuuga, and the Hyuuga do not use swords."
Kori grimaced in sympathy, remembering the one time she had ever had to deal with that stupid council and their Hyuuga politics. It had certainly made her thankful that she wasn't a Hyuuga, and that she only had to share a few strands of DNA with the clan.
"What are you going to do?"
Rin shrugged. "I'll train with him a bit, but it would take a lot of training to get me anywhere near the level needed for combat. Plus, there's the fact that I really like my sword and don't feel like fighting any other way. And I'm damn good with it." The two other girls nodded in agreement.
"What about you Karin? Anything going on with you?" Karin thought back on the past few weeks and tried to come up with something.
"Umm... nope. It's been pretty boring around here. My mom has started Jiro and me on poison training, though." Kori picked up another cookie, telling herself that she'd do an extra lap around the village to burn off the calories.
"I thought you didn't want to become a medic?"
"Oh, I don't. But mom figured that if she was starting it with Jiro she might as well do it with me and give me immunity to some of them in case I get stabbed or shot with something." Kori nodded, seeing the usefulness of it, and decided to talk to her parents about it later.
"Oh, and Ken kissed me." This had the two girls sitting up, nearly launching themselves at her.
"This is one of the things you bring up before the poisons! What happened? What was it like?" Karin wrinkled her nose.
"He came up to me when I was looking at the fruit in the supermarket and tells me that ever since we had been seated next to each other in class that he had been in love with me." She ignored the 'aww'ing that was coming from her friends and made a face. "Then he grabbed my shoulders and stuck his tongue in my mouth."
"Figuratively or literally?"
"Literally. The boy actually smashed his face into mine and shoved his tongue in. It was positively disgusting." The other girls shook their heads at the predicament she had been put into.
"What did you do?" Karin shrugged and leisurely picked up another cookie.
"I punched him so hard that I knocked him out and then came home to sanitize my mouth." Imagining Karin's fury and chakra enhanced punch made the girls wince in sympathy for the poor boy, but they figured it was alright since he deserved it.
Though the fact that this sad event had been her first kiss just had to be pointed out.
Okay, a few things:
1) I forgot that Karin was an actual character in the series (Seriously, I forgot about her character completely. That's how much I care about the girl). My Karin has nothing to do with the actual Naruto Karin, and unless that chick actually does anything noteworthy she probably wont even exist in my story. I just like the name.
2) Yes, I know I didn't list the parents of the children (I'll get to it later, promise). I didn't do this for the whole "ooh, you have to guess" thing (maybe partly), but because it's more realistic. How many children mention their parents in passing and specifically give their names?
Until next time, my beloveds! Kisses!