Roleplay

While Sakura browsed the medical texts, Finlo drifted over to the fiction section while keeping an eye on the front entrance. There were two other customers in the store, a pair of girls that were cooing over what he could only assume was a romance novel. The employee was behind the counter, a bored expression on his face as he stared out the display window. Finlo closed his eyes to get a feel of their life energy and found nothing out of the ordinary, their energies matching up with the emotions they were displaying.

Genuine civilians then.

Turning his attention to the books in front of him, Finlo plucked one down, glanced over it, and then repeated the process with several more before he found an interesting one. Something about dragons reclaiming their lost home. He figured he'd might as well get it, since it'd give him something to do when they had downtime. It would also lend more credibility to their ruse of browsing shops.

He made his purchase before making his way over to Sakura. "All done? We should hit up the shinobi general store. That wouldn't look too suspicious."

((Sorry, the reply is a little short!))

Sakura leafed through one of the newer medical textbooks she hadn’t noticed last time. It wasn’t long before she realized this was below her skill level and did nothing to advance her knowledge. Sakura sighed. It might be time to admit that a small shop like this would not carry the kind of books Sakura needed to challenge herself with.

Satisfied she hadn’t missed anything, Sakura went to find Finlo. He had a book with him. This piqued her curiosity. “Oh? What did you get? Anything good?” She asked as they walked out of the store.

“Yeah, I’m fine with that. Later, I was hoping we could go to the flower gardens too. My friend Ino, I don’t know if you remember her, grows a lot of her family’s flowers there and sometimes I check on them for her. That would be a mundane task too.”

“And I really hope that restaurant girl doesn’t see us do that either,” Sakura laughed.

((All good! Sometimes short replies are all I can muster myself haha))

~~~

The line of Finlo’s mouth tilted into an amused smirk upon Sakura mentioning their previous waitress. “If she didn’t already get the message, that’d seal the deal.” He glanced down at the book he’d tucked under his arm. “It’s just a fantasy book.” He noted that she hadn’t gotten anything. Maybe books weren’t her thing? He didn’t really care to ask. That’d void his whole I don’t want to get to know you thing. Her hobbies weren’t relevant to the mission.

“Anyways, we can do that.” He’d been trying to plan where they’d go and a flower shop was as mundane as it got. “And I’m sure I don’t have to tell you to not say anything to your friend.” All he remembered of Ino was that she’d been part of the Uchiha’s fanclub.

Finlo left the bookstore. Outside, the air still had a wet chill to it, but the sky was clear of storm clouds. People were coming and going and for a moment he wondered what it was like to be a normal person with a normal life, normal expectations of what was going to happen. Shaking his head, he glanced down the street. “Stocking up on weapons won’t look unusual for us.” In light of what had happened, they’d look like they were preparing for another attack, which was a very real possibility.

“That’s cool,” Sakura replied, noting Finlo’s lack of information. She tried not to dwell on it. Where’s the harm in sharing a book title? It wasn’t like Sakura would make fun of Finlo’s reading selection. Then again, maybe he was being selective again—trying not too share too much unless one of them ends up dead in their next off-the-books mission. He had probably seen a lot of friends perish during Anbu ranked assignments. “And, no, I won’t tell Ino…though you might make her as jealous as I made your waitress friend.” Sakura added this with a full laugh. She couldn’t wait to see the look on Ino-pig’s face when Sakura strolled in with a guy as hot as Finlo next to her.

“True, might find something useful at that shop too.” Sakura led their way to the shinobi general shop as the street started to grow heavy with the morning shoppers. Given Orochimaru’s (and their mystery attacker’s) affinity for poison, Sakura was going to check to see if they had any antidotes available for sale. A few of those tucked away would be useful and then Sakura wouldn’t have to spend her chakra to cure them.

The bell above the shop’s door jingled as Sakura and Finlo walked inside. “Do you need anything in particular? I was thinking of getting a few antidote vials for my collection.”

"I'll likely look at weapons, stock up on what I need." One could argue that Finlo didn't need weapons with his abilities, but a weaponless shinobi was a dead shinobi. No one would rely solely on their chakra capabilities and while his energy operated differently, it still had its limits like chakra did. "Antidotes are a good idea." Orochimaru was fond of venomous attacks. Having counteractive antidotes on hand would be wise. If they worked.

He debated splitting up to go look at their own stuff, but the store was large enough that he wouldn't be able to keep an eye on Sakura. "Let's look at your stuff first." Finlo found the medical section, giving it a cursory once over to see if there was anything he needed. He ended up snagging a roll of bandages and a jar of antiseptic cream. He always carried basic medical supplies on a mission since not every Anbu mission had a medic-nin and even if they did, he'd rather not rely on one source of healing to save his life.

"Snake venom antidotes would be a good idea." There were vials sorted by species, all laid out neatly.

Sakura wondered if Finlo felt the same flicker of impatience that was beginning to tease its way into her body. The shopping was a practical distraction and Sakura was genuinely excited to trick Ino, but beyond that laid their real mission. A mission that could get her closer to Sasuke. Sakura glanced over at Finlo while he talked. He seemed calm as ever. Maybe it was her inexperience or her strong emotions that was making this harder for her than him.

Thankfully the medical equipment proved to be enough distraction to pull Sakura out of her own head. “Hmm,” she hummed to herself as she looked over their selections. “I’ll get a couple of different ones. These two I can combine, this one is the most common, oh! This is new!” Sakura thought out loud as she plucked her selections from the display. The vials were small and she could carry them all in her hands for now.

“Maybe a basket would help?” She said looking at the items in Finlo’s hands. “I do need some more weapons.”

“Yo! Sakura! What are you doing here?”

A voice ripped into the quiet store as Sakura’s eyes widened before she turned around to face Kiba Inuzuka and his canine companion, Akumaru, with a quick smile.

“Hi Kiba, Akumaru,” she replied, stepping in front of Finlo to try and hide him behind her body. It was a pretty useless maneuver as Finlo stood taller than her. Akumaru, nearly taking up most of the aisle, barked twice at Finlo.

Kiba tilted his head as he listened to his ninken. “Yeah, who is that? You got a boyfriend other than Sasuke? That’s hard to believe.” Kiba laughed.

Finlo glanced at the ninken. He’d never been one for pets since they weren’t suited for his… lifestyle. At least ninken were highly trained and intelligent dogs compared to the average canine companion. “I’m Finlo Akashiro,” he said, voice neutral if not polite. Last he was aware, Kiba Inuzuka wasn’t anything special among his age group, though he came from an important clan. Finlo couldn’t help the slight smirk that spilled across his face. “I must be better than this Sasuke then, though it’s his loss.” It might be easier if Sakura’s friends thought they were dating rather than wondering who he was and why they were spending time together.

He didn’t look at Sakura to see what impact his words had had on her as he turned away to go get a basket. He returned with two, handed the pink-haired kunoichi one, and looped the other through his arm. “What about you, Kiba-san? Have you dated anyone interesting?”

The look on the Inuzuka’s face was rather priceless. It seemed he hadn’t recovered from Finlo implying that he was indeed Sakura’s boyfriend.

Kiba laughed and crossed his hands behind his head. “Pfft, are you kidding me? I’ve dated a lot of girls, just can’t settle on the right one, you know? Gotta find one Akumaru approves of too.” The ninken glanced at Kiba and whined in confusion.

So no one. “Well I’m sure you’ll find someone eventually, Kiba-san.”

The squeak that escaped Sakura’s mouth was so high that she wondered if only Akumaru heard it. Did Finlo just say they were dating? Inner-Sakura wanted to laugh at the joke, revel in the chaos this would cause. Inner-Sakura was also highly impressed by this devious side of Finlo, who was not so much a stick-in-the-mud as he often portrayed himself as. Quickly composing herself to their new undercover relationship, Sakura beamed back at Finlo and Kiba. “Why pine for a guy who doesn’t even care about me, right?” She never thought she would make a comment about Sasuke so flippantly.

Sakura thanked Finlo as a he returned with a basket for her. She placed the antidote vials into the basket as she listened to their conversation. She did her best to hide her smirk at Kiba’s obvious buff. “I’m sure Akumaru is a good judge of character.” Sakura added quickly after Finlo’s comment, trying to balm Kiba’s no doubt injured pride.

“Exactly! You get it, Sakura! Gotta do right by Akumaru because he comes first.” Kiba ruffled the top of Akumaru’s head. Sakura wondered if he was trying to hide the fact that Akumaru was clearly confused by the whole ‘lots of girls’ comment.

A moment passed between the three of them before Sakura cleared her throat politely. She weaved her arm through Finlo’s, holding on to his muscled upper arm with her free hand. Her other hand held the basket with ease. This would really seal their new cover. “Well, Kiba, it was nice seeing you, but we have a lot planned today in the village. It’s not often that I have downtime from Lady Tsunade so I’m trying to make the most of it. Privately…”

Sakura ended her sentence with a playful wink towards Finlo before looking at Kiba. “I’m sure you and your lots of girlfriends would understand that.”

“Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah! Actually, that’s where Akumaru and I were heading next ourselves. To go get ready—for a date tonight!”

Again the dog whined.

((Threw out my back yesterday :( ))

~~~

Finlo could tell Kiba was still trying to get over his shock at their implied announcement when he and Sakura left the Inuzuka boy to continue their shopping. "You have a lot of friends," Finlo said offhandedly as he slipped out of the pink-haired kunoichi's grasp once they were out of sight of Kiba. He briefly wondered what Tsunade would think of the rumor they'd just started. It was bound to reach her at some point. She'd likely be endlessly amused and never let Sakura hear the end of it, he'd bet on that at least.

The weapons aisle was well stocked as Finlo picked through what he needed, adding paper bombs, kunai, shuriken, and smoke bombs to his basket.

He closed his eyes to check on the nearby life energies and found nothing unusual. Kiba and Akamaru had left. He briefly touched on Sakura's to find her a tight bundle of several different emotions. He inwardly sighed. At least she'd played along. She didn't seem angry, but for all he knew she was going to let him have it later. He didn't think she would have let even the notion that she'd date someone other than Sasuke fly for a second. "Got what you need? The flower shop is next."

“I’m honestly surprised Kiba didn’t recognize you from our academy days. Then again, he's not the most observant.”

Sakura shrugged at Finlo's statement. “I guess with everything going on in the world and what our group went through as gennin, we’ve all stuck together.” Except you. Was the unspoken words that sat in the air around them. It saddened Sakura to think that Finlo could have been part of the friendship all the Teams, including Team Guy and the Sand Siblings, if he hadn’t been recruited into the Anbu. The air felt cool on her skin as Finlo pulled away from her.

Sakura stayed silent as they shopped. There was something she desperately wanted to ask Finlo, but didn’t want to do inside in case they ran into anyone else. Or if Kiba was still nosing around, trying to get the best gossip to report back to everyone. Not that most people would believe Kiba right away. He tended to exaggerate and that would work in their favor. This new cover might even help them slip away for their secret mission. It wouldn’t be abnormal for new lovers to hole up in an apartment for a day or two, not needing to go outside for anything.

The rumors they were about to cause…

She finished paying and walked them outside. “Yes, the flower shop. If we need anyone to seal the deal on our new cover, Ino will be it.” Sakura stepped in a puddle from last night, frowning as she got her sandal wet. “Hey, Finlo…do you have any regrets about being Anbu? Would you want to be anything else?”