Description: Episode 7: The Lone Gunman OR Shot In The Dark. When Kerian shoots Nataya's hammer in half while practicing his marksmanship skills near the abandoned shrine, he winds up meeting Nataya, who's busy honing a completely different set of skills. Kerian finds a quiet moment in introspection, reminiscing about his past. As for Nataya? Nataya just gets her porch swept.
Kerian's eyes narrow at the tree. An epic staring match - pretty young Englishman versus inanimate hunk of wood. The Englishman's eyes never waver, locked on the plant, his instincts focused to the fullest. The predatory look on his face is almost enough to offset the overall effeminate-ness of the young man's body, and anyone walking by might almost feel bad for that tree.
The target pops out, a hunk of wood tied around the tree and tacked to a string. An ingenious trick - when a piece of something fell on the string, the board springs forward.
The gun is in his slender, delicate fingers in a heartbeat. There's a flash of white chi within the barrel, and it rips outwards, a tightly-focused bullet ready to shred all in its path. It tears through the target like lightning, continuing on to blow a hole in the tree behind it. His lips purse, shifting into a frown. Too much force. He hadn't gotten the hang of adjusting it.
Oh well. That's what practice is for, he reflects, spinning the gun on his finger and sliding it into the holster under his jacket. He was getting better, at least. Maybe he wasn't as good as Ginyu, but he wasn't bad.
Kerian turns back to the shrine, white hair swirling around him as he does so. Thoughts of his master always provoked spiritual feelings.
So how does a wandering monk girl make an entrance?
When a person claims to be of serenity, usually what ends up happening is a graceful descent from on high, coupled with a smug, knowing laugh. Another popular way to appear on the scene is to fade in gradually with the teleportation powers that seem to come with the robes and contemplative non-commital nature that drives people crazy.
There's a slew of tropes that accompany her character type, but she eschews them all in favor of a more realistic approach. After all, flash and dash isn't her thing when she doesn't have to use it. Overall, she finds the whole thing pretty much pretentious. Life comes easy when you never worry, and even easier when all your decisions are made instantly with little hesitation.
One such decision is to rebuild the shrine. It's not that no attempts have ever been made before. Certainly, there's always some rallying call made by local youth groups and other special interests to clean up the place and make it look presentable. However, lack of funding and the usual tiny teenage attention span has curtailed many of the attempts before they even started. Lastly, there's the whole matter of city ordinance sticking the place in a paperwork Brigadoon the likes of which will probably see the place rot and collapse on itself before any sort of governmental action takes place.
Unfettered by such things, Nataya arrives in her overalls, heavy work boots, T-shirt and USMC sweatshirt with the arms cut off and suspicious stains spattered all over the front to get to work. The going is slow: one twentysomething woman does not a construction crew make. Nevertheless, it's a work in progress as she started from the inside out, floorboards pulled up with dust everywhere and the stink of mouldering dry rot floating up through the shrine proper.
She clambers back into the hole in the ground, raising her hammer to continue her demo work, when suddenly a shot rings out!
And blasts the head of her hammer clean off just before it hits the rotted floorboards.
What Kerian didn't see was that the little chi bullet passed straight through that tree, through a flimsy, rotten doorframe, and straight through her hammer, which is going to make carpentry a whole heck of a lot harder.
A squint and a hop out of the shrine later, she's busy trundling around the grounds, looking for a grassy knoll, where presumeable one would find a lone gunman, pre-announced by a cry of, "Someone owes me a new hammer!"
Kerian spins away from the little memorial to stare at the shouting monk woman. His icey blue eyes lock onto hers, the very picture of shock and confusion for all of a moment; that moment ends abruptly when he peeks over her shoulder, realizing that the chi bullet had gone -through- the tree.
-Dammit!- Always women.
The Englishman runs his fingers through his hair again, dusts himself off, and puts on his best smile. It's just a bit of a throw - it's hard to believe that eyes that held such intensity about three seconds ago could now be softened so quickly by a thing as simple as a smile.
Admittedly, he was a pretty good actor.
"Ah...did I do that?" He asks after a moment, lilting English accent rolling across every word like a cookie through sugar. He purses his lips and frowns again. "I'm sorry..." Kerian continues, pulling out his wallet and thumbing through the bills, looking for an appropriate amount while at the same time taking in the woman's features.
His eyes don't stray from her face - sheer peripheral vision combined with an incredible amount of willpower assure that - but he makes certain he's aware of every little feature...just in case she was concealing a weapon or preparing a strike. He wasn't a -pervert-, after all. He was a Valentine, and he'd damn well make certain he acted like it.
Finally, he pulls out a few bills and holds them out to her, his smile resuming - but not quite reaching his eyes. "Will this do?"
Nataya's eyes flick over Kerian, and it doesn't take her but a second to notice that the man is weilding a gun. Still, he's not making much of a fuss about it. No ranting or raving. Just has a gun, and is likely the person that blasted her hammer apart, if his instant confession has anything to do with it.
Since he's not causing a fuss, there's no reason for her to press the matter any further. She takes the money without hesitation, and thumbs through the bills quickly, counting them off and doing the estimate in her head. Hm. She hands one of the bills back, and nods. "That should cover it," she says, more concerned with the construction setback than any eyes being made at her. For all accounts, she's just some mousy little Asian woman, about as distinct or descript as the billion other mousy Asian women wandering around the country.
Fingers fold the money quickly in a manner that suggests that she's no stranger to dealing with sums of money. Uncharacteristic for a monk, perhaps, to most people that aren't in the know. But then again, she doesn't really /look/ like a monk at present.
As for her expression? It's pretty neutral. She doesn't seem fazed by his smile or his gun. Even for someone with an eye for detail, the expression is perfectly calm, as if she deals with lone gunman hanging out in the forest shooting chi bullets at objects day in and day out. It's an almost supernatural level of calmness, if that sort of ridiculous description floats your boat.
Still, it can't go completely without comment. "Would you mind not aiming at the shrine? One miss, and it'll collapse on me, and while I doubt it'll kill me, I can't afford a chiropractor," she says offhandedly as she turns, pocketing the cash.
Kerian nods, holstering his weapon. "I'll do you one better, luv," he says, tilting his head around the tree to get a better look at the disrepair of the shrine. "May as well help out. Nothing better to do."
Well, that was mostly true. It wasn't quite as altruistic as it sounded - first off, the out-of-the-way nature of the shrine meant he got a bit of distance from the road, and he had bad luck hanging out on roads. Second, it meant he could scope out the local shrine-goer(s if applicable, he reasons) and see what he was dealing with.
Third, it was the polite thing to do, and he'd be damned if he'd let a slight woman he'd wronged do all that kind of work alone. Nosir, he was a gentleman, and he'd act like it.
He stuffs his hands in his pockets and start following her. "I figure you may need it, and I'm the one who's set you back anyhow."
And fourth, if anybody came looking for him, he had a hiding place. And possibly backup.
They'd have to see.
"Sure," she says, turning her head to smile a little. "I could use some help with cleanup." She indicates with a gesture to the half torn up boards and the heap of discarded old tatami mats lying in a 'box' that's just a bunch of hastily nailed-together old branches in a loose approximation of a box.
"Hope you don't mind scuffing up your shoes, because this work isn't clean, and I'm constantly dealing with termites and other bugs falling from the ceiling. I fumigated with bug bombs like a week ago and the nasty things sprinkle from the ceiling like rain every time you hit a wall," Nataya informs as she steps about the place to her toolbox and utility-bike parked nearby.
The 'utility bike' is a monstrocity in and of itself. An old beat up Schwinn with a welded on additional frame of aluminum makes it look like a rolling pile of scaffolding. Getting it up the hill must have been a challenge, since junk of almost every description can be seen hanging on, under, in, or around it's metal frame. Food crates hold not just food, but nails and what appear to be cheap superballs. Clothes hang from part of it, and they're clearly not in her size or for her gender. Still, located elswhere on the rolling market is a set of old art smocks.
"Here, put this on," she says offhandedly, tossing a paint spattered accoutrement at him, which reads 'Don't Knock My Smock Or I'll Clean Your Clock' written on the big pocket up front. "It'll keep your clothes clean." A hand genstures to the back of the bike where a few brooms are sitting. "Go ahead and sweep the front stoop while I move that pile out on the wagon."
With that, she clambers on the 'roof' of the utility bike to unlatch a red Radio Flyer wagon fron the contraption, already pulling it towards the mountain of mats. It would appear that she's a little short on questions and long on commandeering his assistance. Who or what Kerian is doesn't seem to concern her as much as the repairs to the building at this point. Either she's very dedicated to her work... or she's just that secure. Either way, while it may not seem particularly bright, she's pretty confident with herself.
It keeps her from flying off the handle, at least.
Kerian nods, examining the smock for a moment and tying it around himself. Well, sort of - he has to fluff out his hair behind him, then perform a complicated dance to tie the smock about his neck before the ridiculously long hair falls down. A repeat, and he's ready to work.
"I'll be alright," he agrees, examining the building with a critical eye, then examining the Scwhinn. "Is this yours?" He asks, looking over it for a moment before rounding it to grab a broom.
His slight fingers wrap around the handle - he'd brushed things out of a shrine many times before. It'd always been Ginyu's favorite means of 'training' - that training that might be useful, but was probably just the master getting out of work.
"I'm Kerian, by the by," he offers, getting to work on the steps. "And you are?"
"Cleaning a shrine," Nataya replies with a slight grin. Some people do get her name immediately. However, some don't, and it's really Nataya's whim or perhaps something else that determines who does and who doesn't. Needless to say, she doesn't seem particularly coy or mysterious about it. It's blatantly obvious she's not interested in sharing that bit of information. Not yet, anyhow.
"Yeah, that's my little Ferrari," she says, grabbing a load of mats and dropping it on top of her wagon. The dust that flies up is atrocious. However, most of it seems to simply avoid Nataya or flow around her, as if repelled by some unseen force.
"I sell stuff I find for the most part, and do deliveries on the side, when I'm not teaching at the local senior center," she supplies, before Kerian asks. It's easier to just explain that up front, since she sometimes gets mistaken for homeless because she's usually in a deplorable condition as a result of the endless number of odd jobs she does in Chinatown. Quite the busy bee, she's obviously not afraid to get her hands dirty as she backs up and hits a post, sending a nasty rain of bug parts and dust. "Guh. Nasty," she says, brushing out her hair.
Kerian nods and chuckles at the joke, ducking expertly out of the way of the rain of bugs and dust. He's obviously a fighter - if the chi hadn't given it away, the speed of his dodge certainly would. "A working girl," he agrees, "Always good." It was just conversation, really, and his eyes stray back to the road every so often as he sweeps, evading the occasional filthy deluge as he does so. "So why the shrine, if you don't mind me asking?"
The Englishman gives another look around the raggedy, rickity shack of a thing, moving into a quicker sweeping pace. "Just...one more thing t'do? Goodness of your heart? That sort of thing?"
He ducks a chunk of wood as it thunks against the floor next to him. That one was close - might've taken out a chunk of his face had it hit.
Of course, he's so busy ducking the first chunk, he doesn't have time to tilt his head forward and avoid the second. It nails him right in the forehead, and one of his hands flies up to rub his (unscarred) face before he turns away from her. Hopefully she'd forget he'd even been hit, and he wouldn't have to explain that out to her.
"Tired of paying rent," is the answer that Nataya supplies. "I figured that if I fixed it, I could live here instead of paying monet to live in that rathole apartment in Chinatown. I always end up with scraps when I do my dock deliveries, so I started dropping off everything here and working on it during the weekends," she explains. "No electricity yet, but I unclogged the water main a week ago."
If she's kidding, it doesn't sound like it. Still, the explaination doesn't really make much sense. Who'd want to live out here, for one thing? The site has been the location for more than a few 'epic battles', and ends up on TV a lot because of the usual SNFs and Neo League activities that go on in the town.
And then the man gets hit. Her first instict is to move to intervene, but she doesn't. Stopping just short of a second step. For some people, she'd be there tending to injuries. However, the same reason keeps her from divulging a name also keeps her from making further intervention on the part of any injuries he may have sustained, real or imagined.
"Careful there," she says offhandedly. "The ambulance doesn't come up the hill. I'll have to drop you in this wagon here and haul you to the nearest hospice, which is three miles from here. You don't want that. Trust me." A certain Ayame would have more of a mouthful to say on that matter, but that's neither here nor there.
Kerian gives a bit of a chuckle and makes another show of the rub as he turns around. That was close. She didn't need to know about his chi reinforcement, no matter how strong he was. No need to take stupid chances.
"That's not a bad plan," he agrees after a moment. "The rent, I mean. Not the being hauled to the hospice three miles away. That...is definitely a bad plan."
He gives another little chuckle and dusts the final bits of the shrine's steps off before heading inside to start sweeping again. "Cheap. Out of the way. Surely you won't have too many visitors, and the wood for fire's right out front. If you're savvy you can make quite a bit of food last for quite a while, or if you're smart, you can figure out how to live off the local area."
God, how many times had Ginyu just tossed him out into the middle of the woods, sent a note to school, and left him there for a week or two? How often had he been pitched off cliffs or over waterfalls and been told to 'survive' or 'get home', with nary a compass or rations? Granted, it had been effective in teaching the well-to-do boy how to live without money, but it was still pretty harsh to do to a thirteen-year-old.
A smile spreads across his lips as he brushes. The shrine looked pretty similar to the old place, too. Run-down, sure. Lacking in the little personal touches, like Ginyu's bottles of sake all over the place, or the huge futon his equally huge master had slept on, or the little secret hiding places Ginyu'd stick things for him to eat, then pretend to be angry and pretend the treats had been for him...but a shrine was a shrine.
He gives a bit of a sigh. "Reminds me of home," he murmurs succinctly, those icey blue eyes going a bit distant.
"Really?" Nataya steps back to look at her work. "Reminds me of a municipal dump," she admits with a shrug before getting back to the task at hand. A product of a more urbane environment, most of Nataya's life was spent living the life of a city dweller. Nothing so dramatic as wilderness training. As difficult as her training was, she was never too far from the comforts of city life if she needed them.
As Kerian gets all dreamy-eyed, Nataya continues to labor, exhibiting a focus and endurance that pretty much characterizes everything she does. With the mats piled on the wagon, she carefully descends the steep steps to dispose of them at the dumpster below, and then begins the arduous task of climbing back up again. It's not the most exciting task, but then again, not everything can be exciting.
As she passes Kerian on her way back up the steps, her face turns to look at him. "So what's the deal? Guns and chi? You some kind of Sengouku period throwback, or another 'assassin'?" she lets go of the wagon to put the word in finger quotes before catching the handle before it hits the ground. "There's like, way too many assassins runnign around in this town," elicidates the monk girl as she progresses on up past him to the shrine proper for another load.
Kerian snaps out of his reverie, locking onto her. His eyes widen at the first, and he smiles after a moment. "Right in a t, luv. Long story short, succession of a Warring States style." That wasn't the -entire- story, of course, but it was good enough. "Nothing so dramatic as assassination. Just...a good man helped me out when I sorely needed it."
He purses his lips again. "Speaking of assassins, ran into one the other day. Shot a man I was playing cards with, middle of the bar. Bang - right through the forehead." He mimes shooting someone with his finger. "Kicked him out...not fast enough, though. Wish I'd caught him beforehand - the man had a dynamite hand." He frowns and dusts some more of the floor. "And he was a pleasant fellow. Never found out what happened, but it was a bit of a bother." And then there was the woman who'd attacked him in the mall...and the woman who'd attacked him in the same bar...and the woman who'd attacked him just down in the clearing...
He had bad luck with assassins.
"Ah well. Can't dwell on the past." How incredibly hypocritical of him, he thinks. To say such a thing when he was hunting for killers...
He dismisses the thought with a wave of his hand and nods at her. "Complicated stuff, this town."
Weird story. But then most people she's met so far have had weird stories. Nataya considers his statement with the same attention that she seems to give to everything else in her life: not much. That's what it seems like, anyhow, as she doesn't really question the veracity of any of his claims. "Sure. That's how it is. Throw a rock, hit a ninja," she says cheerfully, not really expanding on her statements any further. How she has any clue about Sengouku era firearm techniques remains without context.
She dusts off her hands as the second load is placed into her wagon, and she sits down on the wooden base beam that part of the wood floor used to be nailed to. "Well, you've helped me," she considers, and then stands up to stretch. "Why don't you let me help you out there. You were practicing, right? If you want, we could cross techniques, I guess."
Admittedly, she doesn't really look like a fighter, but then again what exactly does a fighter look like, anyhow? Generally not unassuming short ladies, considering the garish costumes or weird attitudes most of them like to sport. "That is, if you feel like fighting. It's sort of what happens around here, so I guess it'd be sort of rude for me not to ask at least once."
Kerian, at this point, has probably stopped thinking of 'fighting' as something for men, after having the crap kicked out of him by two older and nearly losing to a 14-year-old ninja girl. So when she offers, he looks at her for a moment, considering what possible type of fighting she could have. Melee was a near-certainty, but what else?
Finally, he stops and shrugs. "No, I think that's alright. There's a lot of work to be done here, and I'm not one of the 'looking for a fight everywhere I go' types." He glances down at his watch. "Besides, it's nearly teatime, and if we take too long, we'll miss it. Always take time for tea." Sure, it was a stereotype. But he really did enjoy his teatime.
Besides, he always made sure to have good tea.
"Maybe some other time, but not when there's quite a bit to take care of."
"Suit yourself!" Nataya's not one to dwell on anything, and it's not like she's a fighter first and foremost. If anything, she's a happening, randomly descending on people's lives like some kind of overly chipper natural disaster. However, Kerian hasn't demonstrated anything that requires her intervention. Not yet, anyhow. For most people, it's just really a matter of time.
Everyone is different after all.
Nataya just continues the work that borders on tedium with a smile on her face and a diligent ethic. She doesn't even break a sweat, despite the amount of walking up and down stairs the work requires. It's almost like she's incapable of even getting tired or winded, instead keeping the same look of mild concentration on her face the entire time.
"Well, I'm going to keep working. Make sure you put everything back before you leave," she informs him on one of her passes up and down the stairs. "And thanks for the help, even if you did shoot my hammer in half."
Kerian nods as she walks out, finally holding up his hand. "Ta, luv," he remarks over his shoulder. He had resumed his trip down memory lane, judging by the way he was brooming (much slower). "Have a nice day."
Not a bad girl, he thinks idly. Ginyu'd've liked her dilligance, at least.
"Just like home," he whispers, staring at the room again. "Just like home."
Log created on 23:43:09 10/17/2008 by Nataya, and last modified on 02:54:49 10/18/2008.