Chapter 3
I report to the Hard Master in the morning, and he instructs me to rest for the morning because I am starting another week-long contract in the afternoon.
"Something strange happened tonight," I tell him after he has given me those instructions. I proceed to tell him about the Kamura girl.
"Well, what did you expect after your battle last week?" he asks me. "You took out 20 armed men by yourself without breaking a sweat, and after having been up for three days and three nights. Of course you've gained a reputation."
"Those men were hopeless!" I protest. "It was an easy fight!"
"Easy for you. Thus your reputation."
"Hard Master," I say, trying hard not to sound like I'm explaining something insanely simple even though that's exactly what I'm doing, "if it was easy for me, it would have been for anyone. I haven't seriously trained since I left for the war."
"Ah. Is that where your confusion is from? I suppose I shouldn't be surprised... you're the same child who amazed the Seeing Master by being oblivious to the fact he could hear about 20 times better than the average person."
I frown, puzzled. The Seeing Master was my main sensei when I started my real training. When he first started training me, he let me know most people could not hear as well as I do, and was surprised I hadn't realized it before. What the connection is between that and the fact I'm out of shape, I don't know.
"Do you think we would send you on potentially dangerous missions if we didn't know you were up to it?" my uncle asks. "The fact you haven't trained in a couple of years has not affected you at all, just like we knew it wouldn't."
I try to look politely puzzled. I fail miserably.
"You think that I've either lost my mind or that I'm playing with you," the Hard Master says.
He's absolutely right, but thankfully, he sounds amused instead of angry.
"I don't understand what you're saying," I say.
It sounds a lot better than what I'm thinking, my thoughts at the moment being mostly centered on questioning his sanity.
"You realize you are the product of generations of selective breeding, do you not?"
It's a rude way to put it, but yes, I know what he is talking about. The Arashikage select parents-to-be based on desirable genetic traits. I nod.
"You inherited your fantastic hearing from both your mother and father, although yours is even better than either of theirs. You also inherited a more exclusive quality… as far as I know, it is unique to the Arashikage bloodline. Even within that bloodline, it only appears in a few individuals. Your father, for instance, did not have it."
I wish he'd stop being cryptic. He seems to be waiting for me to react.
"What quality?" I ask.
He actually chuckles. This conversation is now officially creepy.
"After your first session with him, the Seeing Master came to see me to thank me for this student," he says. "I had expected as much: it would have been quite rude of him not to do so. I was pleasantly surprised, however, when he told me WHY he thought he would enjoy teaching you. Do you remember the first exercise he asked of you?"
This conversation, by its weirdness as much as anything else, is seriously testing my patience. I really wish my uncle would get to the point and tell me why in the world he believes I don't need to train to maintain my skill level, or what's left of it.
"He asked me to perform the early training kata number 1," I answer. I'm burning to ask him how a training session that occurred ten years ago has anything to do with my current situation, but I don't.
"And you did. For the first time, at that point, in five years. Young Master, the reason you were deemed a prodigy all your life is not that you are a quick learner; neither is it because you are especially strong, or fast, or agile. You're not any of those things."
I can't help but frown. Only my uncle can make calling me a prodigy an insult.
"The reason you have progressed so fast," he continues, ignoring my frown, "is also why you don't need to keep training to maintain your level. You never forget any skill. You remember, effortlessly, everything you memorize, and more importantly, so does your body."
The Hard Master pauses, looking at me, apparently trying to make sure I follow. I'm frowning, which may be what prompts him to try another explanation.
"You often hear people say that you never forget how to ride a bike. To you, EVERYTHING is like riding a bike. When he asked you to perform the first kata you had ever learned, the Seeing Master expected to have to describe it to you. Instead, you just went right ahead and executed it. The Seeing Master also noticed, during the session, that you hardly lost your balance at all when performing your old katas. You fell much more often between them than during them."
I don't know what to say. Unlike what was the case for my hearing, I do know I have a much better than average memory. But to say that my body remembers, too... I don't really believe it. It seems to me that my uncle has found a way to alleviate his guilt for sending me on, as he puts it, potentially dangerous missions.
"You don't believe me," he says. He is frowning, back to his own self.
I swallow nervously. I can't call him a liar, and I certainly can't tell him he is delusional, either.
He sighs.
"That won't do," he says. "You cannot keep on thinking we are condemning you to gradually regress and lose all your skills because you don't have time to train. Don't you realize we would not do that to you? You are the future of the clan."
"I understand our financial situation," I say. "I know our options are limited."
He sighs again.
"Obviously, I need to prove to you that your current lack of training is not affecting your skills. You think you're not competent? You think any other ninja out there could take you out?"
"Maybe not just any of them," I say, thinking of the cowardly Kamura girl.
"Most of them, then?"
I nod.
My uncle snorts angrily.
"You will participate in this year's tournament," he says.
My eyes widen. The tournament is a competition between most of the ninja clans in the country: selected fighters from the different clans fight each other in non-lethal matches, and the winner of each match advances to the next round until a champion is found. The Champion receives a monetary prize, but more importantly, it is a great honour for his or her clan. Being eliminated in the first round, on the other hand, is extremely embarrassing. If my uncle wants me to participate, he is bound to give me some training time.
"How much training will you let me do?" I ask, my voice trembling in anticipation.
"None," my uncle answers. "You will not train at all, and when you make it to the final round, you will hopefully realize that not training is not affecting your skills."
I swallow. This is insane. If I don't train, I will be eliminated in the first round and the clan will be a laughing stock: the main wage earner of the once-great Arashikage clan, not to mention the future leader, eliminated in the first round. I can't let him do that.
"Hard Master..." I start.
"This is not open to discussion," he cuts me off. "I'm well aware that you think you will be defeated in your first match: that's precisely why I'm entering you and why I will not let you train ahead. You need to realize you are wrong. You need to realize you are just as good now as when you left for the war. Now go rest."
He's being an idiot. He's going to regret this and so will the rest of the clan. But there's nothing I can do about it: he is my superior, I have to obey him. I bow and leave for my room.
I hear Chatterbox walking towards me, probably on his way to meet his teacher in his office. I hurry my steps, hoping he will be more opened to me than yesterday. He stops when he sees me but says nothing.
"I'm sorry about yesterday," I tell him. I mean both for the probation and my anger, but I'm too embarrassed to elaborate. "And for your family... what happened?"
"Car accident," he sighs. "All three of them..."
He looks like he's about to cry. I have no idea what to say, and I would understand if he never did forgive me for my behaviour yesterday.
"Excuse me," he says, walking past me towards my uncle's office. He turns his head back. "I don't want to be late on my second day," he adds with a ghost of a smile before trotting off.
It's a sorry excuse for a joke and a smile, but it's still a huge relief: he wouldn't have bothered with it if I wasn't forgiven.
- Seven months later -
"Came to cheer me on, brother? You're wasting your time."
I just finished changing into the clan's uniform to find Chatterbox standing in the locker room, looking nervous.
My first match in the tournament is in two minutes. I'm expecting to lose, and my mood is rotten. I hate that I'm going to embarrass the clan, and I'm furious at the Hard Master because it's all his fault.
"Afraid not. I'm in the tournament too," he says. His tone is no more cheerful than mine, understandably.
I curse. Is the Hard Master TRYING to make us a laughing stock? Chatterbox only started his real training four months ago: he can't be ready for this.
"Did he tell you he expects you to lose?" I ask.
"He expects me to make it to the second round."
"Figures, seeing he actually thinks I'm going to make it to the final." I sigh. "Well, good luck, brother."
I press his shoulder before I leave the changing room for the arena. I expected him to stay behind and change, but he follows me.
"When is your match?" I ask him.
"Half an hour. I'll change after yours."
I nod. I don't mind if he sees me lose, he'd hear about it anyway. Besides, if there is only one ninja in Japan who won't be mocking me after today, it'll be him.
I enter the arena. My opponent, a member of the Raikou clan, is already there, waiting. He looks me up and down and smirks.
"So you're the Arashikage slave-boy, are you?" he sniggers. "You don't look that impressive."
I resist snarling at him. I'd love to beat him up for calling me a slave, and I know painfully well that it's just not going to happen: quite the opposite.
The referee gives the signal and we start.
We stop less than a minute later: he's on the floor, clutching at the arm I just broke. I wasn't trying to injure him, the hit was only meant to force him to block high so that I could strike at his legs and bring him down. His block came too late.
The referee asks him if he wants to continue. He shakes his head and my eyes widen. He's giving up?
The referee points at me and shouts "Winner, Arashikage!". I'm so relieved, so disbelieving, that it's all I can do not to fall to the floor. I feel a hand clapping me on the back. I turn, expecting my brother – there's so much noise that I can't hear a thing - but he's a few steps back, with the Soft Master. They're both beaming at me. The Hard Master is the one who just clapped my back; he's not smiling.
"Try not to injure anyone else," he says. "We don't want to alienate the other clans."
Chatterbox's match lasts longer than mine, and leaves me even more disbelieving. If I didn't know he had only been training for four months, I would have believed him to be a student of several years: he's genuinely good.
He eventually defeats his opponent with a hold that immobilizes her for the required thirty seconds. The Hard Master congratulates him and my smile fades: all I got for winning was an admonition to be more gentle with my opponent. The Soft Master notices my reaction and sniggers.
"Would you congratulate an eagle for flying?" he asks me.
I snort, cheered up if a bit embarrassed by the compliment. He's right, of course. Why would the Hard Master bother to congratulate me for winning my first match when he genuinely believes I'm going to make it to the final round? For the first time since he told me he was entering me in this tournament, I'm flattered by his confidence. This nice feeling lasts for about a minute before reality sets back in: my uncle's confidence is grossly misguided, and a lucky win in the first round is all that saved me from completely humiliating our clan. I suddenly realize that my brother's win means that I must win my second match as well. The clan will be the subject of almost as much ridicule if I don't do better than our newest student than if I had lost my first match.
Author's Notes:
I thought you might be wondering why it looks like I'm practically giving Storm Shadow super powers. Well! The first thing I must say is that I'm really not.
His hearing is fantastic, but that's consistent with the comic books. Speaking in tongues to avoid spoilers, in the comic book, he can pinpoint the location of small animals from a fair distance, through solid and bulky obstacles and he is eventually assumed to have been able to do the same with a person, that he would also have identified by sound only, from an even greater distance.
As for the memory thing, that is indeed my invention, but all that's done for him is bring him to where he is now, and I need it for several plot reasons – including as an explanation of why his uncles feel comfortable sending the clan's heir on dangerous missions and not arranging for him to have time to train. As for why he needs to be as good as that has allowed him to become and to remain, let's just say that nobody would have any reason to go through major amounts of trouble to secure his services were he just an ordinary ninja.
The other thing you may be wondering about is this Seeing Master character. I started the story using the Blind Master, as readers of the comic books may have guessed, but he really did not fit what I needed him for, so rather than risk antagonizing his potential fans, I played it honest and created a new character rather than force an existing one into an ill-fitting mold.
As for the name, this character can use his other senses so well that although he is blind (which is the reason I was originally trying to use the Blind Master), he can "see" just as well or better than most people. He is just a minor character, in case you're wondering. :)
Thanks for reading!