Description: Arguably this scene is about Drake meeting up with his on-again, off-again mentor Ryuhaku Todoh, aka Lieutenant Japan. But what Todoh would tell you is that this is actually the first log of one-hundred and sixteen about his quest to get back 200 yen from a lion tamer. Draw your own conclusions.
With a recent Rebuild Southtown event done with, Drake has realized that he's... a little out of practice. How this happened, he's not sure. But since then (a couple days now), he's thrown himself headlong into physical conditioning. This moment in time is no different, seeing a certain youth running through the forest. He springs into the air to grab ahold of a low-hanging branch, swing forward, flip ahead, and- oh, right, no trees in front of him.
Caught in the air flailing, Drake hits the ground with less than a perfectly graceful tumble, ending on his rear. Well, it's a damn good thing no one's around to see this little embarrassment. Right?
<insert long paragraph attempting to explain what the hell's gone on after so many months here>
<insert one-sentence statement more or less invalidating said paragraph here>
<insert forty-five minute delay for pose here>
<insert bizarre justification for appearing here>
"So you've been looking for the circus too, eh?!" Comes a cantankerous old man's voice as he's busy(?) sitting down next to a tree. "Like some kind of out of work acrobat! They say the economy is hard, yes?! Pah! But no! There will always be a NEED for the Todoh way!!"
Ryuhaku Todoh, the renewable resource of complete bullshit.
"You know that lion tamer, boy?!" He approaches with a wild look on his eyes, a scent of a man who may or may not have washed his clothes in... five months now, is it? Yes. Let's just say five months without a proper wash and let's be done with this descriptor.
"He owes me money! A whole 200 yen!! And I'm not leaving this spot until he comes by and gives me my damned money!" He huffs as he stomps along towards our poor little would-be acrobat.
A voice. A particularly familiar, harsh voice.
Drake is jolted into a low crouch, whirling around to face the ever observant:
"L-.. Lieutenant Japan..!"
Cue themesong.
Drake quickly rises to his full height, bewilderment not subsiding. "You've been here the whole time!?" For a lion tamer? Drake didn't even know a circus had been through town! Well, that's what he gets for being all over the world. Though some clarification apparently needs made, and the teen shakes his head vehemently. "No, I'm not looking for the circus - I'm keeping sharp!"
Because, you know, Todoh was being TOTALLY SERIOUS. Right? Drake can't tell half the time.
"..Two hundred yen, huh?" It seems like such a small amount to pay for the Lieutenant's time...
"Oh really?!" The old man shakes a fist. "I'm such a kind man, you know! He blithers about some sort of foul concoction involving something on a stick and I feel like spotting him some money because it wasn't even mine in the first place!!" ...Does /he/ owe 200 yen instead?
"Bah! Shows me! Guess what, kid - you want 200 yen YOU DON'T GET 200 YEN!! And that's my two hundred yen! That you don't two hundred yen." He clears his throat. "I hope this has been educational, boy! Because I should've charged you 200 yen for telling you that!"
Huff, huff, huff. He starts to turn around to storm on out of the formerly peaceful clearing. This peaceful clearing was peaceful until he just had to give a piece of his mind.
"I'll find that circus if it's the last thing I ever do!" But, surely, their meeting - brief as it is already after so long - would not end so abruptly?
Drake opens his mouth a few times to comment, but each time, his mouth closes again. Man, the Lieutenant's all fired up over those two hundred bucks. And they weren't even originally his! And then, just as abruptly as he'd encountered him, Todoh seems to be storming off.
An eyebrow quirks.
An impish smile touches to his lips.
"Sounds like you've been dishonored," he calls.
Technically that's more the equivalent, roughly, of... two dollars. Maybe a little less. (Fighters don't give a damn about exchange rates, when everyone accepts violence as a means of trade - and it's no wonder why stuff like Taizhou happens.)
"Yes! Yes I have, smart-pants!" Todoh yells back as he abruptly walks into a tree. He doesn't fall flat on his ass. No, now he is all up in the grill of this tree, as if expecting it to move through sheer old man indignation. It doesn't, because it's a tree. Trees are so lippy. Those damned wooden hipsters and their pretty exotic birds they keep as pets in their leafy hair! Trees are awful.
Or it just could be he's barking his rage up the wrong tree.
"This tree's not helping either!" Todoh unhelpfully declares.
"Well, then!" Drake drifts a few steps after Todoh, linking his hands together behind his back. The whole look is completely innocent. /Completely/ innocent. "How would a warrior of your esteem go about getting his honor back? By just.. walking away? I'm taking notes here, remember! I wanna know what a warrior should do in a case like this!"
And should Todoh look back at him, Drake will helpfully tap an index finger to the side of his head. Mental notes!
This tree will not budge. This tree will not negotiate. /This tree will not surrender./ This tree is the perfect soldier. If this tree were in Taizhou right now, it would have whipped Seishirou's scrawny little butt and be unmoving against all resistance. This tree has the potential to be the greatest warrior of them all.
It is entirely to Ryuhaku Todoh's detriment that he will not stop to induct this tree into the Way of Todoh, difficult as it would be since it cannot comperehend human speech.
"So you're studying, eh?" He says without turning around, somehow squeezing his left hand between his chin and the tree his face is currently pressed up against. "Because you wouldn't pass for some kinda spy acrobat in a heartbeat!"
He harrumphs, face still to the tree as he removes his hand. "Say, boy. Let me be sure here. Are you a tree?!"
Oh, god dammit, Todoh.
"I.. uh.." Drake looks positively stunned by this, the facade of innocence dropped instantly and replaced with a much more sincere look of 'wtf'ery. His mouth opens decidedly...
Then shuts.
Drake lowers his head, hand scratching over it slowly. He really has to wonder about his helpful instructor sometimes. Is he asking that question to the overwhelmingly tree-like tree, or to him? The collision he had was a pretty hard one, does he even know where he is right now?
"I.. I.. what..?"
"Bah!" Todoh turns around, shaking a fist. "I hoped you'd be able to talk some sense into this thing! But I guess not!" Huff, huff, huff. He starts stomping along angrily back towards the boy.
"Now about your little question I should also charge you 200 yen for." He strokes his chin. "Now see, what you ask is... is..."
His head droops a little, eyes narrowed, "Is..."
His eyebrows go all angry again. "...is..."
"What was it again?!" He shouts.
Drake is left more stunned than he was before at this conclusion. Talk sense into the tree? Drake's no sorceror! And neither is any sorceror he's ever met!
But when Todoh turns and confronts him, he feels more comfortable. Aggression, Drake is familiar with. He's used to staring the Devil in the eye, as it were. He's used to standing tall, squaring his shoulders, and saying, 'What you got!?' with full gusto! He's-
oh he forgot
Drake slouches a little, staring at Todoh in disbelief. But he quickly repairs that casually innocent demeanor from before, hands linked behind his back and scuffing a couple toes against the grass. "You know.. your honor. It's taken a hit. What're you going to do about it, to regain the lost honor?"
"Oh yes, lost honor. Right. Right. Yes. Ahem." One must wonder - as the head of the Todoh family, considering his actions, words, and particular penchant for inexplicable wanderlust in borderline physically impossible places - if he really understands the weight of the concept of 'honor' and how he carries himself.
"Normally speaking I just beat the crap out of 'em!" Which is... what everyone does. Todoh wags a finger while he puts a hand on his hip. "Show 'em with their might, and all that rot. Except this time there's one... teensy... weensy... little... PROBLEM!"
He starts to huff angrily again. "They aren't here!! I bet they skipped town for South Africa or something!" He'd know, he's done that so many times.
There's perhaps a little bit of wanderlust in Drake as well, World Tour and all considered. So his face starts to light up at a thought.
"So then, wouldn't your honor be best served searching for him?!," he asks, unable to hide the energy seeping into his voice. Hey, he could potentially drag the Lieutenant around for his Tour! Constant training while running around! How awesome would that be?
The old master(?) stares over at the innocent-looking babyfaced wrestling star with intense scrutiny. The sort of scrutiny best reserved for mouthy disrespectful trees that get in your way and don't have the innate politeness to move, never mind that they were there first for like tens of years, maybe even hundreds, just sitting there... growing... getting in the way when you're angrily running off in a huff.
"I like the way you state the obvious." He nods.
Drake works the large, round eyes, the innocent smile, the idly fidgeting foot~...
Success!
..Err, right? Kind of? It sounded like there was a jab in there somewhere, but Drake doesn't mind so much. He got the result he wanted, more or less. "Where would you start? 'Cuz I happen to be traveling around the world, you know... if he took off to some other country, you might find'em with me."
"Where would I start? WHERE WOULD I START?!" And back to shouting and fist shaking and teeth clenching and tree cursing. "Why right here, you dweebenheimer! Is where I started! Because that's where it was!" Huff, huff, huff, huff.
"So what, you're gonna be some traveling circus now, are you, that why you want me along, yes? Hm." Since when did he come to that conclusion, anyway?! "Very well!! That lion tamer won't get away from us!"
He taps his foot. "But we make this clear! That 200 yen is mine! This has gone beyond personal! It is... extrapersonal!" Cower before the might of his grasp of English.
The volume and sheer MAGNITUDE of Todoh's yelling voice is enough to cause Drake to squint, bangs even ruffled.
"But... haven't you been here this entire time?"
Though he puts that as absolutely innocently as he can, there's just the tiniest bit of cheek he can't avoid. And he's aware he's all but asking for Todoh to demand a fight. Though that might be his intention! Training means physical exertion, conflict, and-
did he just call him a circus performer again?
"The two-hundred yen, Lieutenant, shall be yours," Drake says as sagely as possible. "To this, I solemnly swear."
A can of worms has hereby been opened. This may be no mere throwaway meeting of fists being thrown and colored bars being displayed between these thrown punches. No.
This is an encounter that may or may not be the start of beautiful things that totally will affect the world on a grand scale and forever change the playing field forever, all over 200 yen unreturned.
Right?
...Right?
"Bah! Semantics! The bastard child of divorce law!" ...What?! Todoh snarls as his eyes dart around wildly for... you know, any sign of tents being pitched. Stakes. CLOWNS. Of which there are none.
Of course, with Drake swearing in that this absolutely tiny amount of pocket change that nobody should be swearing bloody revenge over (unless they're, like... five years old), the old man takes out a fan and promptly cools himself down. For a given value of... cooling.
"So, trapeze boy, where do ya think a lion tamer would go, huh?" He grumbles. "If you're thinking 'on my fist' you'd be absolutely right except they're not there!!" A pause. "I checked."
Divorce law? Wh-.. was there a Mrs. Japan at one point?
Drake composes himself and clears his own throat. "I'm thinking the circus might have left for the west! Say, England?" The hopeful lilt in his voice is accented by a slight upturning of his head. Yeah, okay, so he's trying to manipulate the situation to keep his errant sensei around, but if said errant sensei would otherwise just be wandering about on mere guess and whim, why not come along?
That's how he placates his conscience, yanno.
"When we track this person down, we'll make sure to put them on your fist. You know, where they belong!," he proclaims helpfully.
Ryuhaku Todoh is a married man. Nobody knows how his poor wife manages to keep her sanity when her husband goes on bizarrely long stretches at a time to obscure corners of the Earth with the same amount of consideration a normal human being would take to go to the market for some... eggs, or something.
But at least his daughter still loves him unconditionally, and him to her too, no matter how many years she's been sixteen years of age.
"Darn tootin'!" The old man says with a touch of agreeability that is increasingly harder to squeeze out of him as time goes on. It is thought that one day his human shell will erode until all that is left is the elemental representation of pure cantankerousness, unbound from mortal flesh.
Or not.
"So, England, hmm... yes, why that place seems full of clowns to me! And lion tamers!" Especially lion tamers! "More than Norway's got!!" Perhaps he has seen that 'educational' Kenya advertisement... made in England.
It's possible. Drake, however, has not. He just knows it's his next destination.
"Awesome. Then it's to England we'll go, hunting down this circus person! ...And fighting!" He'll just slip that little bit in there. Maybe it'll go unnoticed in all the bravado of pounding his right fist into his left palm.
OH MY GOD THERE IS A SUBPLOT. THERE IS A SUBPLOT HAPPENING. Where will it go? Who will it yank into the whirlwind of things happening?
"But first!!" Todoh waggles a finger. "I was asked a week to go to get some eggs." He rubs his hands together. "I don't think they've noticed it's been a week." He giggles in a way not particularly befitting of a grown man of his... standing? What kind of standing could you possibly attribute to this guy anyway?
"AND THEN IT'S ENGLAND TIME! But not any sooner."
...
TREESYS: Tree has ended the fight here.
Log created on 20:08:41 06/16/2010 by Todoh, and last modified on 22:50:57 06/16/2010.