[hider=Clash of the Jounin, as experienced by Shisen and Maruki]

"Well no that is not…" started Maruki. Kirugetsu's expression changed from thinking to mad and looked as if he shouted something but no sound escaped his mouth. Maruki looked a little confused, a quick glance towards Shisen taught him she looked a little strange at Kirugetsu too. That was when Maruki noticed the stranger behind Kirugetsu; he immediately took a Kunai in his hand "Byakugan!" He wanted to charge in at that moment but he saw the man was a Konoha Jounin too and besides, if he wanted to kill Kirugetsu he could have done so already. Maruki released his chakra, his eyes returning to normal, and put his kunai back in his pouch. Kirugetsu's hand moved to his sword, they were going to fight? "Hey! What about us?" shouted Maruki at the two but his question remained unanswered, as the two Jounin didn't seem to hear it.

Shisen shuffled uneasily on her feet when the other Jounin came up behind Kirugetsu-Sensei and she, like Maruki, had a kunai out already. Although, their sensei seemed to be more irritated with the other one, then his hand was moving to the sword and she took a step back. They were going to fight, two Jounin fighting each other in front of the two. This was a rare opportunity, according to the Division A commander, their Sensei was a war hero. Someone who took out of Sai's hearts and they were going to fight. Awe and fear of what she would see, fought each other for the right to stay in her expression but fear won out in the end. She took another step back.

A slight breeze and a barely audible whistle flew right past Maruki; he tried to find out what it was. Then the other Jounin started to speak only to be interrupted by Kirugetsu who drew his sword. For real? These two Jounin were going to fight for real? Maruki didn’t want to miss a thing of it “Byakugan!” He looked closely at the two men, building up chakra. He also noticed the tiny metal balls, creating some sort of static field, around them. That probably caused the breeze and whistle he noticed earlier. Maruki ran up to Shisen, “we need to get the hell out of here, shit is about to go down. Those two have more chakra than I have ever seen before.” He almost dragged Shisen out of the field Hayato created and watched the two Jounin begin with Kiru entering Hydrification and Hayato firing a barrage of sonic blasts.

Shisen saw that Maruki had activated his Byakugan and almost reached out to see if she could feel what he was seeing, if Arashi hadn't snarled at her. Looking down at the Niken, she frowned but didn't have time to really react because before she knew it, Maruki was practically dragging her out the field. She could hear the sonic blast, she had sensitive hearing, so the sound was almost amplified to her, and it somewhat hurt her ears quite a bit. Shisen covered her ears with her hands and hoped that it would be over soon. Arashi was starting to whine, pacing back and forth in front of them. She closed her eyes, trying not to think about the whistle that was bothering her.

The battle between the Jounins only just begun but Maruki watched them breathlessly. Kirugetsu used his Acidic pulse, which he also used at Maruki the day before. A wave of killing intent was send at Hayato and while throwing the Jounin of balance a weaker wave hit the Genin. Maruki shivered all over. This was the same feeling he got at the restaurant when Kirugetsu told him he was the one who killed his grandfather. His sensei also created some water clones but Hayato dealt with them quite easily, destroying the ground completely with it. Maruki sucked everything he saw up as a sponge hoping he could use it to his advantage later.

Shisen was still covering her ears as she watched the Jounin fight, the sense of fear only grew as it did so. Even when one was her Sensei, a seemingly seed of distrust had appeared in her head, she couldn't trust her sensei, not when he was like this. "Make it stop..." Shisen begged. Her ears hurt and Arashi was at her limit, the other Jounin seemed to be kind of mean to their sensei, taking something that he loved.

This was some battle! The Jounin unleashed attack after attack, blocking and dodging it, each move more powerful and more spectacular than the one before. But then something interesting happened; suddenly they were close to each other. Hayato tried to ‘steal’ Kirugetsu’s sword. And he succeeded, at the cost of half a limb. Kirugetsu was furious and lashed out with a massive wave of killing intent, Maruki fell backwards shocked by the sudden tidal wave of fear. He saw himself die by the hands of Kirugetsu. He snapped out fairly quick of it because the battle in the distance was still raging on and because of his Byakugan, he took a look at Shisen if she was alright while the battle in the distance slowly died down.

Shisen was already scared but it was amplified by a huge amount when she felt the wave of killing intent and that had her cowering behind Maruki. Arashi followed after her, circling the toe as she snapped at the air and snarled at anything that moved.

[/hider]

And then, just as suddenly as it began, it was over. Clearly frustrated, Kirugetsu simply repeated what he had said when Hayato so rudely interrupted. "In light of this blatant violation of procedure and etiquette, I am forced to fail the both of you on the final test. As such, you fail my tests as a whole." He gave that a bit of time to sink in, watching the student's reactions. Before either of them lost their cool, he would stop them by raising a hand.

"However. We're rebuilding things here and we're in need of capable shinobi. So I offer you both a way out of being sent back to the Academy." The Hozuki smiled, exposing his shark-like teeth. "You can both fight each other. Right here and now. Winner stays, loser goes. Having fought you both, I'd say it's a fairly even match. So who's ready?" He knew they both wanted to prove themselves. He knew that Shisen, despite her shyness and anti-social tendencies, would not have come this far without something to prove. Similarly, Maruki was of the proud Hyuuga, and wouldn't abide by failure. The plan was perfect, really. He could watch the kids, evaluate them more fully, and get a grasp on where they needed to improve. Question was... would they accept his proposal? Or would they accept failure?

[hider=Maruki vs Shisen]

Maruki's mouth fell open of surprise at Kiru's suggestion. Fight Shisen? "Y-you can't be serious!" called the young Hyuuga, "I need to fight my own teammate?" He looked at the cute Inuzuka girl, she didn't seem all too happy as well. Arashi growled dangerously not particulate at him or Kirugetsu though. [I] Also, I can't hurt an animal [/I] thought Maruki. He looked at Kiru... damn, he was serious. The other option was going back to the academy... well, anything better than that. He decided to leave it up to the girl [I] way to be a chivalrous gentleman Maruki [/I] "shut it, conscience" whispered Maruki, then louder "It's up to you Shisen, just know that if you choose to fight, I will not hold back"

She could only stare at Kirugetsu Sensei, was he insane? Why did she have to fight Maruki? It didn't make any sense to her. "B-but... We are on the same team!" Shisen said angrily. After hearing the other option, failing, she decided that she couldn't back down. Shisen hesitated for a moment "Alright.... We will fight... I-I won't hold back either!" as bravely as she could muster. Already beginning to build up chakra in her body, using the four legs technique to hopefully beat him out in speed would be a huge advantage.

Maruki sighed "so be it" he walked to his place across Shisen about 33 feet apart. He took on his usual Jyuken style fighting stance, "Byakugan!" Maruki was ready; he saw that she was already building chakra. He need to observe and analyze her tactics, not let her or Arashi surprise him... He though it would be better to outplay and outsmart her then to try and utterly destroy her. "Ready when you are" he said and started accumulating chakra, if everything went as planned he knew what his first move was going to be.

Shisen was beginning to take on more animalistic characteristics. Her eyes flicked over to Maruki who had already activated his Byakugan, already prepared to attack her. Arashi, who was now pacing back and forth, was growling quite loudly. She went right at him at first, with no other strategy except to get his arms out of the picture, but at the last minute decided to stop. Her Niken on the other hand, was not stopping and went to attack him head on.

Maruki hoped Shisen would be the one to attack first but since did was not the case Maruki plotted a new strategy. He moved forward slowly, he knew he would lose on running speed but probably win on fighting speed, as long as he could keep both of them in his sights, which was not hard due to his Byakugan, and moved slowly they could not surprise him that easily. He closed the distance to 10 feet and kept a halt. Waited a few moment for Shisen to respond and suddenly stretched his arm in a fast movement, aiming at Shisen's knees; "Vacuum Palm!"

Shisen didn't seem to have time to rethink a better course of action, as Maruki was already coming towards her and even less time to react to the sudden attack on his part. Jumping back with Arashi right behind her, of course, the attack just barely brushed her knees and she trembled a bit. "Arashi, his hands...." Shisen murmured to the Niken who barked once before taking a few steps back. The attack had left her a little weak in the knees, but she was still going to keep moving. A low whistle floated through the air, causing Arashi to run straight at him. Shisen seemed to vanish in a blur motion, going at him from the back before switching to the sides. However, Arashi was not aiming at his throat but his fingers.

Maruki had already thought his attack would miss his target; the speed of the couple however surprised him. Instead of dodging he just stood there, planting his feet firmly on the ground, although it was hard, he was able to keep track of Shisen as she ran from his sides, to his back and to the other side. If he moved he would be caught between the two, no matter which way he would go instead of straight at the dog. The time he took to think out this move was the time the dog took to close the distance. Nothing was left to do but to deflect the dog’s attack. As the dog lunged at him, Maruki let himself fall to the side, launched a few quick punches at the legs of Arashi, rolled over and quickly stood back, ready to defend himself as they decided to follow up on the attack.

Shisen had a kunai out at this time, ready to plunge it into his back or whatever body part was needed. While she had been lucky and not gotten hit, Arashi had been hit. Letting a low long whistle escape her lips, she changed the attack plan. Her Niken was having a hard time getting back up so Shisen darted over and stood as guard into Arashi was back on her feet. A bit shaky but still on her feet, once she had stopped shaking, they attacked. Arashi who always got the front, switched to the back while Shisen took the front. Then they switched, crossing their paths loosely and tightened up the crossings so it would appear that they weren't appearing to be two separate attacks. Arashi lunged at his back, her speed making it nearly impossible to dodge her claws as she jumped up to latch onto him. Allowing Shisen, to have the opportunity to get him with her kunai at the front.

Maruki was not given the time to launch his own attack as the couple quickly got back on their feet and darted all around him fairly fast again. Maruki saw they the attack he launched the feet of the dog landed, as she seemed at little slower than before. Maruki now knew what they were planning but a quick turn of the dog made her attack path shorter, and with it Maruki's time to think, he would risk a couple of claws in his back and getting pinned down by Arashi or a direct hit from Shisen, the latter was decided as that attack was likelier to dodge and likelier to be less damaging. Maruki spun around on his feet, took one step towards the already in mid-air dog, gave her a Shotei in the chest and ducked forward past Arashi hoping to dodge Shisen's attack as Arashi came in falling in between of them.
Arashi yipped as the attack hit her, trying not to be sent flying in the wrong direction but failed as she was sent towards Shisen. Upon seeing her Niken come flying at her, her eyes went wide but before she ducked, slashing her kunai while she did and managed to get him on the arms and partly on the hands. She had little time to catch Arashi, darting under her to catch her and then darting away from Maruki. Not knowing how much more her Niken could handle, she went for his hands again, as they were the most valued weapons he had with his Jutsu.

She was fast he'd give her that, able to slash him while he ducked away, laying down Arashi and attempted to slash him again as soon as he got back on his feet. The pain in his arm and hand was excruciating. The blood dripped form his hands. At last he disabled Arashi for this fight and he felt bad about it, but he could not afford to lose. Shisen came at him and attempted a slash again. Maruki pivoted out of the way and attempted a quick punch between her shoulder blades to give her trouble breathing. Not knowing if he hit her he decided to create some distance in case he didn't and she slashed him again. This way she needed to close the distance again first

Shisen was sure that with his damaged hands and arms, the attacks would come slower, giving her more time to attack. If only a slight change in speed, there was a slight decrease to his speed but that didn't do much for her. Especially when the punch did hit her, knocking the breath out of her and causing her to stumble a bit on her feet. However, she did manage to regain her footing but lost the chance to get him and so she went at him again, this time from a different angle.

Maruki saw that his hit landed as Shisen stumbled and lost her balance for a second. She was quick to regain her composure and rushed at him again. Maruki wondered if the hit that disabled Arashi fueled her anger and determination. The anger of a woman was not to be thrilled with. Now that she came from his right side, the side of his wounded arm he had less chance to hit her. Not that he couldn’t use his injured arm but it would hurt like hell. Instead of dodging he decided to counterattack. He took one step towards her, time seemed to slow down, he looked deep into her eyes, and he saw hers widen of surprise, "Hakkeso Kaiten!" (Eight trigrams revolving heaven). If the attack would hit her it would leave some damage but nothing severe, but if she was able to jump away and dodge it at the last split-second he pronounced his attack he would form an easy target as soon he stopped it.

Shisen saw him seem to slow down even more, giving her more time to react and therefore to get him. She took out another Kunai as she ran out, coming to face with him right before he attacked and sadly, she was unable to dodge it. It was however, not a wasted moment as the two kunai made contact with his other arm, impaling him from both sides. She jerked back, too quickly, stumbled a bit and then the world spun, she managed to stay on her feet but with considerable effort. Arashi barked her encouragement and snapped at the air.

This was his chance! With a seemingly impossible jump he got to Shisen before she was ready "Eight trigrams 32 palms!" [I] This'll be the end [/I] "two!" [I] My arms hurt like hell [/I] "four" [I] I need to keep this up [/I] "eight" [I] I just hope I don't injure her too much [/I] "sixteen" [I] only one more [/I] "32!" he hit her with both hands sending her flying. Maruki fell to his knees. The pain in his arms was killing him. He saw that she did not stand up. He had won… [I] I can't believe it, I- [/I] Maruki passed out of fatigue. He fell down on the grass with a smile on his face.

Arashi limped over to the knocked out Shisen and stood guard over her, her front legs at one side of the body and her hind legs on the other side. Angry growling at anyone who dared to come near her.

[/hider]