Cleaning the Streets (Private/Mission)

Mission:

Takeshi jumped as the sudden cry of a nearby raven shook him from his thoughts. A small sigh would escape the blonde youth's lips as his turquoise colored orbs slowly drifted from the direction of the noisy bird and focused on the dirt road before him. Once more the boy found himself on yet another mundane task that did little to challenge his skills, save for the ability to keep himself from throwing yet another fit before the staff members within the administration building. Missions such as these felt like nothing more than cruel jokes. Takeshi had worked far too hard to become a ninja to be delegated such underwhelming work. Mailing letters, collecting pets, cleaning hospitals, picking trash. It was all far beneath him. The boy was far from silent with these thoughts, both in action and words. Many a time the young male had expressed his displeasure with the subject to his female companion and in many instances the boy's actions had reflected his bad mood; the most recent involving a local bully whom had been terrorizing one of his clients. Though Takeshi had been specifically instructed during the mission briefing that he and Chikami were not to do lasting damage of any kind, Takeshi had managed to not only break the child's nose but also ended up knocking three teeth loose. Luckily the request for restraint had not been a parameter of the mission, per-se, and the boy was not penalized for his actions beyond a stern warning.

The thought caused the boy's eyes to roll upwards in a clear sign of annoyance as he began to move slowly down the road, grabbing at various pieces of trash with his left hand before tossing them into the thick black garbage bag he held in his right.

"I can't help but feel like I'm being punished for our last mission."

Takeshi would groan lightly as his eyes slowly drifted in the direction of his childhood friend. As of late the two had spent quite a bit of time together. That fact alone wasn't too strange in itself, as the two had been nearly inseparable since their days at the orphanage, but with the passing of their academy classes, Takeshi had always figured that the two would have ended up giving each other space due to their ninja duties. Never would the boy have ever expected himself to wind up on the same team as Chikami. It was both a blessing and a curse. While it was comforting to have his one and only friend by his side, at times like this he couldn't help but feel a strange sense of guilt over the fact that he seemed to make her life needlessly difficult. Had it not been for his overreaction during the last mission, the two might not be out here picking trash as they currently were.

Though Takeshi fixated on these thoughts, he refused to speak of them. He felt far too ashamed of himself to even think about apologizing for what he had done. Realizing that he was staring at the girl, his eyes quickly flitted back toward the trash on the road, his arm reaching for several pieces before tossing them in the bag. Thinking about such things was ultimately a waste of time. For better or worse, Chikami was stuck on his team until one of them managed to reach the rank of Chuunin. At this rate, such a goal seemed well far off. Another small sigh would manage to escape the child as the sobering thought hit him harder than a bag of bricks. How in the hell were the two of them supposed to become Chuunin if all they got were these asinine tasks for missions? How would they ever become battle ready and experienced? So far the only real sign of battle the two of them had seen since their academy days were in their training sessions with Daisuke-sensei and on missions like their most recent one. To the young boy, it seemed as though reaching such a rank was far beyond their grasp and as that thought sank in, Takeshi couldn't help but force himself to focus on finding the next piece of trash. Thinking about this stuff was too much for him at the moment.

Minutes would turn to hours as the two Genin would continued their work of cleansing one of Konoha's main thoroughfares of the unsightly trash that tarnished the otherwise well well kept roads. Throughout the task, Takeshi couldn't help but continuously wonder just how long the two had been working and how much longer the two would need to work before accomplishing their mission. By now the bag in Takeshi's right hand was well beyond full, nearly bursting at the seams and dragging dangerously across the ground. Surprisingly enough though, the bag didn't tear or burst despite the obvious strain it showed. Even now, Takeshi had noticed the state of the bag and as such found himself surprised by just how durable the container truly was.

"Chikami-chan. My bag is full. Do you think we've done enough for today?"

There had been no exact specification about how much trash needed to be picked, rather just that the two Genin pick trash. Takeshi, despite his rather depressed mood, had managed to spot other Genin teams here and there, working along other roads in picking trash. Perhaps this was a community wide effort for new shinobi. Either way, Takeshi did not believe for one second that the two of them could clean the whole of the city. Such an expectation was ridiculous. With a small grunt the boy would move to heft the bag up and over his shoulder, careful not to let any of its contents spill out as he began to make his way toward the waste disposal area of Konoha where the two of them would hopefully deposit their day's labor and collect their wages.

Here they were yet again. Their last mission had been the one in which that had led to actual fighting, on one of the ninja's parts at least, but now they were back to doing mundane tasks that reminded Chikami so much of errands. Perhaps Konoha was running low on its civilian count to conduct these simple tasks, and thus they had started to pay they low-ranking shinobi population to help out. Or they were merely punishing the two childhood friends because of their rather odd track record. For their last mission, lasting damage had been dealt to the lead bully, and they were specifically instructed not to hurt the bullies in a way that could be considered 'lasting damage'. Never mind. They hadn't been penalised too heavily, aside from a good scolding from Administration passed down (supposedly) from the Hokage. She thought that it was a way to scare the two of them more, if they thought that the Hokage was upset with them, but she knew that mission feedback was not their leader's priority, so why would she concern herself with it? It seemed pointless to care too much, as long as missions were getting done.

She picked up a discarded candy wrapped and flicked it carelessly into her garbage bag that she held in her left hand, turning her head to look at Takeshi when he spoke up to voice his thoughts on why they had been assigned this mission. She looked at him as they walked side by side down the street, picking up trash as they went. A small smile touched her lips and she shook her head slightly, depositing a scrunched up newspaper into her garbage bag. "I doubt that they would punish us for a bad mission. They just hand out these missions because we're new Genin, and it gets the jobs done for them at least." She mused aloud, although it was obvious that she was directing her words at her companion. "Besides... if I had actually stepped in and done something, you would have never gone overboard." She lowered her gaze to the ground while she worked upon saying as much, a frown taking over her delicate features all of a sudden.

Their last mission still haunted Chikami; it was probably somewhat noticeable if one looked hard enough at her facial expressions and the way in which she was hiding something. Buta had said that she sucked as a ninja, and she was more than aware of that. Heck, she didn't even want to become a kunoichi! It was pushed upon her because the orphanage needed their older kids to be shifted out, that was all. But it still tasted bitter in her mouth that she was terrible at her job. What good to the village was she, if she couldn't even put down a few unruly kids? Goodness knows that she wouldn't be able to fight on a battlefield unless her opponents were training dummies. 'If those kids weren't just harmless Academy students... and Takeshi-kun was in true danger, what would have I done then? Stood there and watched in terror as he was stabbed, mauled, maimed?' She thought to herself bitterly, and the thoughts made her shudder noticeably while she continued to work on her job for the day.

She delved so deep into her current state of work and deep thought that she didn't even focus on anything else. She nearly walked straight into numerous civilians going on their way down the street, and almost tripped over her own feet too many times for her to count. 'I need to... I need Takeshi-kun's courage... just a little bit... to defend those that matter to me. Otherwise, I'll just get people killed.' She thought, grabbing and scrunching up a flyer that had been discarded on the ground.

"... Chikami-chan. My bag is full. Do you think we've done enough for today?"

The voice of her childhood friend broke through her lack of concentration and she slowly found herself coming around from her inner thoughts and brutal realisations. She blinked, obviously startled, as she turned and face Takeshi. She had only just realised that she had run out room in her garbage bag either way, so it wasn't like she could continue even if she wanted to; just for the sake of mulling things over some more. She cracked a small smile and nodded, tying a knot in the top of her garbage bag and admiring their joint work of cleanliness down the street. "Yes, I think we're done for the day." She nodded slowly and started to head back with Takeshi to report in and collect their reward for the mission. Silently, the little girl pledged to start building her own courage to protect her childhood friend and anyone else she started to hold dear.