Momma, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Samurai

[cubofkai]

Who: cubofkai, a horse, and you.
Where: Just about anywhere; the Lake
When: Afternoon!
Style: Either/or!

When Mitsuhide had told Yukimura he could train a horse to allow him to ride as he usually did, he took that to heart. Nearly every morning since he had been working with a stallion nearly as excitable as he was, chatting excitedly to it as he taught the horse with surprising patience.

Now his hard work was paying off.

If you hear the sound of pounding hooves, you may wish to get out of the way.

Yukimura was crouched on the back of the stallion, one foot sideways and the other placed squarely between the beast's shoulder blades. He held his hands at his sides, missing the feel of his spears in his hands, as they cantered through any space big enough and empty enough for an excitable horse and his master to pass through.

If one were to follow them, eventually they would find a laughing Yukimura near the lake, brushing the sweat off the equine's body as it drank its fill.

Comments

[cubofkai]

It is not that Oyakata-sama is weak!

[ Yukimura looks startled that anyone would even think he was insulting him. ]

But he has been struck by illness, and that is an enemy even the strongest of warriors can fall against.

[redcloakedthief]

Illness, huh...

[He pauses. He knows that story well enough--Lord Uther had fallen to the exact same thing. A pause...and he nods.]

Alright, fair enough. I'll give you that one.

Then you'd better stop following and start leading.

[cubofkai]

...that I have been trying to do.

[ Trying because... Yukimura knows that he is not a very good leader. He is not sure most days why the Takeda are willing to follow him. ]

[redcloakedthief]

[He taps a finger to his lip momentarily before, well--]

Trying is hardly good enough.

Don't let down your lord that way. Come now--is this the way of life of the samurai?

[cubofkai]

I would fight for the Takeda with all my soul, were I with them again.

[ Yet... ]

Though all I find myself able to do now is stay in this place and wait to see what fate brings me.

[redcloakedthief]

...Nah, that's the wrong way to look at it! You've got time here--why are you just going to squander it away.

Time is money, after all!

[That might almost even sound like Sasuke, complete with cheeky tone.]

[cubofkai]

[ ... it does sound like Sasuke, almost as if it had come out of the ninja's own mouth. ]

I do not mean to squander it. Do you have a suggestion, then, for what I should do with it?

[redcloakedthief]

[Heh.]

Then work for it. Make use of it! Do something with your time here.

Figure out why it is you still can't lead. That's more worthwhile than just vowing that you will, someday in the future.