Akira Kazue

Akira Kazue(一恵 彰, Kazue Akira) is a kunoichi of Konoha and a member of Team 7. Her dream is one day to defeat her first sensei, Mito Gai, in a taijutsu fight.

Background
Akira is born a mere eight months before the Kyuubi Attack, and becomes an orphan at birth. Her mother, Kazue Ume, dies in childbirth, while her father, Kazue Junon, is a civilian doctor who is killed some months earlier when an Iwa infiltrator chooses to commit suicide by blowing himself up rather than be captured. She grows up in Konoha's sole orphanage, under the care of the stern but matronly Madame Shigemi, and for the most part keeps to herself, preferring to read or watch shinobi fight at the training grounds.

On her seventh birthday, she runs into Mito Gai while attempting to copy some of the taijutsu techniques she has seen, and he decides to test her dedication by offering to train her - on the condition that she attends the Academy the following year. Akira agrees, and soon becomes enamored with achieving the strength and grace of a true taijutsu master. A young Rock Lee, who catches her training by herself one day, makes fun of her for wanting to learn taijutsu over ninjutsu, to which Akira replies with a challenge - when they are both genin, they will spar, Lee with his ninjutsu, and Akira with taijutsu alone, and they will see who is stronger.

Four years later, having not exchanged more than passing words and reminders of their upcoming battle since, Akira overhears Lee practicing - and failing to perform - the basic ninjutsu that every Academy student learns. She confronts him, and discovers that because of his disability, Lee will never be able to perform ninjutsu, and thus their much awaited battle is no longer a possibility. Undaunted, she decides that if Lee cannot fight her with ninjutsu or genjutsu, he will simply have to do so with taijutsu. In order to make the fight a fair one, she offers to help him improve his taijutsu technique and resolves to postpone their match until they are on an equal level.

The next day, Yamanaka Ino, also having overheard their conversation, asks Akira to give her some tips on taijutsu so that she can impress "Sasuke-kun" with her abilities, to which Akira scathingly replies that she will not help Ino unless the other girl wishes to improve for her own sake. After Akira defeats Sasuke in a class spar, Ino again approaches her, having thought on Akira's words and remembered the true reason she decided to become a shinobi in the first place. Akira, though doubtful of Ino's resolve, agrees to train with her, and the two eventually strike up a tentative friendship.

When the end of their last year at the Academy rolls around, Akira graduates at the top of the class, much to the frustration of Sasuke and Akira's own bemused happiness. To their mutual dismay, Akira and Sasuke are placed on the same genin team, along with the class idiot, Uzumaki Naruto.

Personality
Akira is generally a very straightforward person, with an open, cheerful, and laid back personality. She likes to approach problems head on and get to the solution by the simplest, most logical route, a trait which is both a help and a hindrance in her career and personal life. She appreciates the simple things in life, and does her best to maintain an optimistic and calm attitude no matter the circumstances, though occasionally her dry wit and sarcasm get the better of her.

While she often becomes irritated when others complain about work or complicate a situation needlessly, she generally keeps her opinions her to herself and tries to keep the peace between her hot-tempered team mates. While her teammates like to argue and fight, Akira prefers to simply go about life without conflict or drama.

During missions, Akira is generally very calm and professional, following the orders of her superior(s) without question or hesitation. However, her blind faith in authority figures is not always a good thing.

Appearance
Akira is quite tall and lanky for a girl, with a somewhat androgynous face, high cheekbones and nose, and long, bony fingers. Her hair is, thanks to her mother's genes, a dark purple color, and tends to stick out in every direction if cut short. To avoid it falling in her eyes during a fight, she grows it out and keeps it in a short ponytail - even when off duty, as she is convinced that her hair makes her sneeze. Her eyes are grey like her father's, and during her first mission outside of Konoha, she receives a cut on her cheek which, when left to heal, leaves a faint scar.

As an academy student, Akira wears dark grey tracksuit pants and plain V-neck t-shirts in various shades of orange, blue and grey, with a white and black tracksuit jacket over the top, and a pair of orange and black goggles holding her fringe back. When she graduates, she keeps this style, only exchanging the goggles for her hitai-ate, worn like a headband.

After being promoted to chunin following the exams and the events of the Sound-Sand Invasion, she opts to wear the standard chunin vest over a grey 3/4 sleeve t-shirt and her usual grey pants. Later, while working part-time in the hospital, she wears a white doctor's coat over the top with the sleeves rolled up.

When she is promoted to ANBU, she receives the standard tattoo on her right shoulder, and wears the ANBU uniform while on duty. Her mask is a crane - a red, black and white water bird. The pattern on it resembles said bird to some extent, with a red triangle extending from the center of the forehead and splitting into two lines that curve around the beak. On each side there is a thick black line that starts on the upper diagonal and curves towards the beak, surrounding the eyeholes.

Ninjutsu
From a young age, Akira acknowledges the importance of mastering the basics over learning flashier techniques, a belief which drives her to perfect the three basic jutsu (Henge, Kawarimi, & Bunshin) to the point of being able to perform each of them without seals by the time she makes chunin. As such, she would be considered strong in ninjutsu for her age group, despite not using or knowing any Nature Transformation techniques until some time after the Chunin Exams. Even then, she prefers to use simple, basic technique that do not use too much chakra, since she doesn't have much to spare.

While practicing chakra control before the mission to Wave Country, she accidentally discovers a technique where, by holding a target in place with the Tree Walking technique and heel palming it with the other hand using the Water Walking technique, she can smash a hole straight through the target. Disgusted by the thought of the gore it would cause, Akira resolves never to use it on a human target, but is forced to go back on her word the very next day when she uses it to kill one of the Demon Brothers.

After a number of other incidents where she is forced to use it to defend herself and her teammates, Akira resigns herself to continuing to use the technique. Eventually, she combines it with an adapted Katon technique which encompasses her attacking hand in a white hot flame, vaporizing the target's blood before it can touch her skin. She calls it 'Katon: Black Death' for the way the fire blackens the flesh inside the wound, damaging it beyond the skill of any medic-nin to repair.

Taijutsu
Thanks to a combination of Gai's tutalge and her own determination to one day defeat him in battle, Akira's taijutsu technique is considerably more advanced than that of her peers. Though she is quite tall for a girl, she practices her skills often enough to have developed a certain amount of grace within her chosen style.

Initially, she focuses mainly on her speed, as it enables her to defeat her classmates with ease. However, as she begins to face stronger opponents during Part 2, Akira realizes that in order to become a true master of taijutsu, she must improve all aspects of her style, especially her physical strength.

Her style is a mix-mash of a number of other styles, including -but not limited to- the Academy Little Forest Style, the Hyuga Gentle Fist Style, and Gai's own Springtime Gale Style, using aspects of each to create a style that suits Akira's physique and level of ability. At the end of Part 2, Lee jokingly calls it the Graceful Crane Style after observing a clumsy crane chick and its more elegant mother, comparing Akira as a child to the chick and noting that her technique has come a long way since the day they met. Much to his surprise, the name sticks.

The thusly-named Graceful Crane Style does in fact resemble the movements of the bird it is named after, emphasizing continuous, fluid movement to evade the enemies attacks and redirection where evasion is not possible.

The user's standard position is with the feet in a front stance and one arm in upper block constantly, though which arm it is can - and should - be switched throughout a fight, depending on which foot is in front. The other hand rests in a fist against the hip bone and can be used for rapid jabs, punches, choke holds and knife-hands to the throat, or even Akira's signature ninjutsu technique, Fire Release: Black Death.

However, the majority of attacks are kicks - jumping, stationary, spinning, and combination techniques - as this allows Akira to make good used of her flexibility and longer legs.

Genjutsu
While Akira lacks the imagination necessary to create complex genjutsu, she is proficient in the use of simple illusion techniques, and is especially fond of applying them while in the midst of a taijutsu battle, reasoning that her somewhat clumsy techniques are less likely to be noticed and cancelled if the target is too busy fending off her physical attacks.

Some of her techniques include: Illusion Technique: One Step Illusion Technique: Tunnel Vision Illusion Technique: Notice-Me-Not Illusion Technique: Sleeping Forest (and Illusion Technique: Sleeping Forest Trap) Illusion Technique: Chokehold

Arguably her favorite technique is the One Step, which, as the name implies, causes the target to see the user one step to the left or right of where they actually are, making their attacks more likely to miss.

Of all her genjutsu techniques, Illusion Technique: Sleeping Forest Trap is the only fatal one. It is an adaptation of her other technique, Illusion Technique: Sleeping Forest, that creates illusionary falling leaves which hypnotize the target - or targets - and cause them to fall into a deep sleep. However it is also the easiest to catch, as the effects are not very subtle and an experienced ninja would have plenty of time to recognize it and cancel it. As such, it is best used for civilian riot control. In the fatal variation, Sleeping Forest Trap, the illusionary 'leaves' are actually a cover for proximity sensitive explosive tags.

Kenjutsu
Although she has never previously used a sword in combat, after being recruited into ANBU at the age of fifteen Akira is required to learn kenjutsu technique, just like all other members of the organization. She trains under her second cousin, Yuugao Uzuki, with input from Yuugao's own teacher (and lover), Hayate Gekko, and with their help eventually incorporates kenjutsu into her original taijutsu style with an acceptable degree of proficiency, generally holding it flat against her raised arm in a reverse grip.

At some point during her training, Akira privately admits to Yuugao that she does not feel she is a suitable candidate for ANBU, as the sight of blood still makes her nauseous, which is part of the reason she is not as enthusiastic about learning kenjutsu as she is about most ninja arts. She feels that bloodshed is unnecessarily messy and cruel, preferring to kill with a blow to the temple or a snapped neck. Yuugao assures her that she too once felt the same way, but overcame it with time - a comment which inadvertently causes Akira to develop a deep fear of loosing her humanity.

Iryo-Ninjutsu
While learning taijutsu as a child, Akira obtained a numerous injuries which required a visit to the hospital to fix. After one such visit, Akira's nurse informs her that she is putting too much pressure on her young body and that she should not be training to this level without a trained medic-nin on hand. Unwilling to put such a limit on her training, Akira proposes a compromise - if Akira can achieve an acceptable level of competency in medical techniques before the end of the school term, the nurse will not inform Gai about her injuries.

Naturally, being a long-time taijutsu user himself, Gai is already well aware that he has been pushing Akira too hard, and secretly adjusts her training program to focus more on speed than physical strength. When Akira announces her intention to learn medical ninjutsu, Gai immediately approves, commenting that if he had the ability he would happily have joined her.

Over the course of the next few years, Akira does improve her medical technique by a small amount, though it is never her first priority and eventually she reaches a point where her control is simply not good enough to attempt any more advanced techniques. She is, however, competent enough to heal the majority of her teammates scrapes and bruises throughout their numerous misadventures.

Fuinjutsu
Because she is an orphan, Akira does not have access to a lot of funds. As such, through time and effort, she learns how to write out her own explosive tags, sealing scrolls and training weights. However, due to a lack of instructional material in the public library, her knowledge of fuinjutsu ends there.

Part I
Plot in progress.

Part II
Plot in progress.

Quotes
"Stop worrying so much, silly! Sometimes things don't have to be complicated."

"What the- you know, aren't you supposed to be dead?"

"Just my luck... not even the self-destruct is working."

"...Well. This is awkward."

"We'll find a way... we always have."

"Hilarious, you two. Really. I think you broke my funny bone."

"Who cares about pretty? I'm going for noticeable!"

"And when I die, I want to be remembered as a good person, not just a good soldier."

Trivia
While Akira becomes proficient with most weapons through her acquaintance with Tenten, she utterly fails at using senbon, which is something of a running joke among her friends and peers.

Part of the reason that Akira is not enamored with Sasuke like the majority of the other girls in her class is that she had once harbored a crush on Sasuke's older brother, Itachi, and was devastated when he disappeared after the Uchiha Massacre, believing him dead.

Her mother's maiden name was Uzuki, meaning that Akira is related to ANBU member Uzuki Yuugao, though neither of them are aware of this fact until Akira herself is recruited into ANBU.

Reference
A shout-out to these sites for giving me the tools to create some awesome pictures. =)

Rinmaru Games' Mega Anime Avatar Creator: http://www.rinmarugames.com/game/?game_id=421

Chibi Maker: http://www.dolldivine.com/chibi-maker.php

Anonymus D.'s Anime Character Maker 2.2: http://www.muchgames.com/games/anime-character-maker-3