IN WHICH THERE IS A LARGE VISITOR [WW ONLY]

[tidesnpc]

Characters: Crew and passengers of the Winding Way
Content: DISASTER.
Setting: The Winding Way and the surrounding airspace
Time: Early morning, around 7 AM
Warnings: More chaos, probably.

Comments

[byakkogan]

Several days spent in the boiler room of the Winding Way had not exactly been the best of experiences. It was, to be honest, Neji's first and (hopefully) only experience with the bowels of an airship, and so he'd gotten a little confused in all the noise and bustle. And then he hadn't been able to make it off the ship before it had taken off, because the damnable engineers had insisted on babysitting the craft from the runway to every degree of altitude thereafter.

It was, quite possibly, the most embarrassing blunder he'd ever made, as a ninja and as a Hyuuga. But he hadn't wanted to leave the ship without his possessions. Singular, actually. And now he was trapped here until the ship next reached land, curled in a shadowy alcove of the engine room where it had gotten quieter, as the days passed, but he still hadn't been able to venture very far--there was some fuss on board about spoons, of all things. Trying to make sense of it just reminded him how long he hadn't eaten in, anyway

[stampeded]

Once more, Vash raced through the ship's corridors, though this time he was headed for the engine room. As soon as he'd seen that sky whale, saying he had panicked was an understatement! Once he'd gotten it together again, he came up with a plan. A plan that mostly included yelling at the mechanics until they could somehow rev up the engine, but it was still a lot better than sitting around and waiting to die!

He was just down the hall when he heard it - a loud series of pinging noises from the engine. He wasn't quite sure what was going on, and wondered briefly if they were already repairing it. It didn't stop his pace in the slightest.

Vash ran into the engine room only to find a single person standing there... one that was directly in his way. He couldn't stop fast enough, and ended up stumbling right into them before losing his balance completely. "GAAAAH...!"

[byakkogan]

He'd been seriously startled by the sudden noises from the engine--it had been acting up, apparently, for some time because there had been a swarm of engineers here earlier, as well as some sort of large yellow squirrel, muttering and pawing over it--it had been somewhat quiet since then.

So the sudden staccato clanging noises coming from the direction of the main boiler was already unsettling enough in itself that Neji forewent caution for the moment--the rest of them would likely be after the creature, now, with less regard for the minute details of the ship's operation. He'd been able to sneak out without problems, before, thanks to his training.

It kind of figured that life would want to smack him in the face, right about then. Quite literally. He barely even registered the hurtling figure (a measure of how hard he'd been concentrating on trying to relate the ship's engine system to that of the primitive plane he'd flown before, because while he'd helped tighten a few things here and there, that was nothing to a structure this

[cachinnusi]

A whale.

There was a freaking whale flying straight for them.

Naruto'd never seen one before, himself, but heard plenty and Kyuubi claimed to have seen them before. Even eaten them. The image he got wasn't very pleasant at all, so he had to push it out while he bolted from his room and quickly down the halls for a second time in the past twenty-four hours. This was ridiculous! He was tired of having his life threatened by shit this week.

After this he was going to do a nice, long round of pranks that involved taking Vash's donuts and sticking them in Tony's room.

Speaking of Vash, he had to find him. As temporary captain and one of the members to have been on the Way the longest, he had to know if it had harpoons. He knew cannons. He worked with cannons and the other guns of the ship, providing ammo and the like, but now that Rikku came up with harpoons... it seemed like the only way to get rid of a whale. He heard something along the lines of aim for the eyes, but passed it off for the moment

[tiny_tinker_toy]

After shutting her journal (that Kiros guy seemed pretty cool for a Victoria dude), Rikku headed off to the engine room...and got quite a surprise.

Vash, Naruto, and what looked like someone else were currently dogpiled. The blonde blinked. "Uhm...Naruto, Vash? Is there something you guys need to admit? And isn't Naruto a bit young for you, Vash?"

[findmyownway]

Tails had been just finished up checking the engines again after repairing them, when the commotion started, when he came out of his corner of the engine room and saw the pile of people on the floor made up of people, he blinked. He also noticed Rikku, but focused on the dogpile first.

"Uh, are you guys okay?"

[stampeded]

Vash grunted as something else landed on top of him, before he could even think about getting up. Great, the ship was in danger, and he ended up in a pile with... who knew who else! It wasn't only not his day, it hadn't been his week.

It was just as he was trying to get up that he heard Rikku. "T-That's not it!" he exclaimed rather loudly (and just a little high-pitched), scrambling up to his feet - and likewise pushing off whoever had landed on top of him. Had she said it was Naruto?! Some ninja he was! Vash was going to have to...

... help that person he landed on! For a moment there, he had completely forgot! Vash reached down to pick the person up off their feet, "I'm really sorry! I was in a hurry, and I've really got to talk to Tails here... are you okay?!" Now that he was looking closer, he realized that he'd just ran into some girl he'd never seen before, and that was impossible - he knew the face and name of everyone on board.

[byakkogan]

It had been difficult for Neji to hear anything over the din of the engines, and the fact that he'd been pretty much swamped in Vash's coat, so he merely sat up slowly, glowering a little at the room in general (when did they acquire an audience?!) testing his limbs to make sure everything was still in one piece.

Now that he could both see and breathe again he noted immediately that, apart from the familiar yellow squirrel, everyone around him at the moment seemed to be human; including--

Everyone. He'd allowed himself to be discovered. And, moreover, by exactly the kind of group he'd hoped to avoid at all costs--the slightly vacant-looking man with a mop for a head seemed to be the focal point of the ship at the moment, judging by the amount of people who'd arrived after him, and he hadn't wanted Naruto anywhere near the whole fiasco

[cachinnusi]

Naruto, though displeased to be simply pushed off, was glad to at least be on his feet again. Rubbing at his stomach and wincing a little, red eyes eventually went up to the others once he felt like he wasn't going to bruise. He felt like he ran into a brick wall. And, despite his mouth opening to retort to Rikku, he ended up saying something else entirely.

"Neji!" he gawked openly, wide eyes, jaw dropping, and rapid fire blinking included. "How--where've--what're you--when'd you get on the ship?!"

His brain rather frazzled at the moment, he completely forgot about harpoons and dogpiles that clearly did not look right at all to an outside party. He also somehow managed to forget about the whale, despite any comments made by Kyuubi. They left Bellcius forever ago (to him), and Neji, too! What the hell was he doing here?

[tiny_tinker_toy]

Rikku glanced between the ninja and the other girl.

"What, she your girlfriend?"

[findmyownway]

Tails continued to blink. Sure this person had long hair, but it didn't look that much like a girl to Tails. "I don't think that's a girl Rikku." Tails said rubbing the back of his head as he watched the scene before him, wondering who this person was and how Naruto knew them.

[stampeded]

"You KNOW her?" Vash asked Naruto, staring at him for a moment in disbelief. Wasn't this girl a stowaway? He almost wondered if Naruto had a hand in this somehow... but no, he looked completely shocked. Unless it was an act?!

He shook his head hard enough that his spikes swayed, saying out-loud, "We don't have time for this! Naruto, get her somewhere out of the way!" After that, he turned towards Rikku and Tails, with a sigh of relief. "You have no idea how glad I am to find you two here! Is there any way you can fix the engine to go faster, somehow?"

[byakkogan]

It took him a few moments process the reactions--and another few to just stare in some amazement, because he'd expected the unexpected (it was Naruto's trademark and it was his own trade as well), but he'd not anticipated the sheer plebeianism of the general outburst.

Then, he got around to glaring. And a Hyuuga glare wasn't something you wanted to be subject to--even without the Byakugan in evidence. He swept each of them with the steely look, very deliberately to make sure they got the point. "First of all, I am perfectly male, thank you. Secondly--" Only to be abruptly interrupted by Vash's sudden switch of topic.

He snapped back to the matter at hand without batting an eye, mentally berating himself for allowing the distraction with such mundane, ridiculous things. Spared a dark look in the company's general direction, before biting out, "I can tell you very precisely that that whale is currently traveling at a speed at least twice that of your vessel. Unless you can somehow complete a radical upgrade in an extremely limited

[cachinnusi]

Sputtering ridiculously at both Rikku and Vash, Naruto's face took on a shade of red to match his eyes before he quickly washed it away by Tails' own remark on his friend's gender. However, he still felt it necessary to repeat Neji, and with that bit out: "Neji can take care of HIMself, and yes, I know HIM! Before I was--we were--"

And then he heard Neji, stopped talking in his tracks, and quickly tried thinking of a way to fix this. He didn't even realize how bad what he said sounded, from where he left off, and just went on a new loop. Fuck harpoons, there was no time for harpoons. If they could get the guns up and going, that could replace them, but it probably wouldn't work. That thing was big. And goddamn fast, too.

Without even really considering that his mouth was running with his thoughts, he started speaking. "Backwards?" Fool, ships cannot go backwards at the drop of a hat, either. "Shut up I wasn't talking to... Shit we can't shoot it, Vash! It'll get angry or or... or it'll fall on something! Like a town or--" he paused

[tiny_tinker_toy]

Rikku gaped at the strange...kid. How he'd know all that? And what was up with his eyes?

"Okay, who the hell is this Neji, and how the hell did he know all that? And what's 'High-whatist?'" The mechanic paused, then changed subject. "Nevermind, I'll ask later. We gotta worry about that whale out there!"
She turned to Vash.

"I've been saying we need to dry dock the Way for a while now. The engine needs a major tune up and I gotta figure out what's makin' it go 'k-plink'. And this kid is right. If it's goin' twice our speed, ain't no way we can get that thing-" she gestured to the engine "-goin' much faster."

[stampeded]

(OOC: Sorry, Tails-mun! We went ahead and skipped him this round to keep the thread going. Feel free to post with him again at any point in the thread.)

Vash was a little too distracted with this problem to hear the protests from Naruto and their stowaway. What he did pay attention to was what they said about their current problem. Vash signed, rubbing at his temples, trying to think. They had a whale they couldn't outrun or hurt. And now Naruto was talking to himself?

No, he definitely had to deal with this problem first.

"Okay, I get it! Rikku, Tails, I'll leave the engine up to you. The last thing we need right now is for it to break down on us. I'd like for you two to help us think of a plan, just... if you need it, keep someone here to keep an eye on the engine?"

Then he turned to Naruto and the other girl, his smile a little wan. "We're almost to the Badlands if we have to kill it, but there's no guarantee our ship can survive that thing if it attacks us. The only real option we have is to chase it away without getting it