User Profile

CHARACTER:
Name: Kisame Hoshigaki
Age: 32
Series: Naruto
Gender: Male
Point of canon to be drawn in: After chapter 354 of the manga, post-Yonbi extraction and pre Sasuke-Deidara fight. He doesn't yet know Tobi's true identity.

Appearance: To first look at him, one can easily see two things about Kisame; three, if you're feeling generous. He's big, he's blue, and he's actually pretty scary to look at. Kisame towers at about 6'5", built like a man who has known hard labor and intense training and combat for his entire life, with long limbs, large calloused hands, and broad shoulders. Just his body seems to exude an air of strength and power, even ferocity and intimidation, and he moves like a man who knows it and knows how to use it; he seems to be intimately comfortable in his own skin, even if he doesn't particularly like it. Said skin happens to be a soft, pale blue, and covered with denticles that make it rough to the touch--a sandpaper-y shark-like skin, that makes him wear through clothes faster than a teenager could outgrow them. He wears a dark navy, nearly black ANBU tattoo on his left upper arm.

His face is a craggy oval with a strong jaw, sporting a large nose and sharply defined features; they're only further accented with thin eyebrows and three angular gills on each cheek, just below dark storm-grey eyes. They're topped by black semi-circular markings, with a thinner rim tracing around the bottom of his eyes, and black eyelids as well. His hair only further adds to the height and severity of his face, dark navy spikes swept up into a messy but practical look. Even the frequent smile he wears does little to soften his expression; the rows of sharp white teeth only seem to make him look even more dangerous.

Comfort seems to be the order of the day for Kisame; he knows he can't hide his strange looks, or pull off any outfits sophisticated enough to make him look like he's refined or actually belongs in civilized society, so he simply doesn't bother making an effort with the whole charade. He'll typically wear a black sleeveless shirt and long black pants, with white striped arm-warmers edged in navy from wrist to elbow, and white stirrup leg-warmers from mid-shin to foot. For casual situations, he'll wear navy sandals, and a navy hitai-ate that wraps around his head and hides his ears, bearing a metal plate with Kirigakure's symbol on it, neatly scratched through. Typically, he also wears a black belt with a back pouch on it, and a similar one strapped to his right thigh; both are usually full of small weapons, typically things like kunai and shuriken.

It's a rare thing to see Kisame without his favorite weapon strapped onto his back; Samehada is an enormous sword nearly as tall as he is, with a long handle bearing a small, polished likeness of a human skull on the pommel. The blade is usually wrapped in bandages to prevent accidental injury, thanks to the many tooth-like blades covering every surface; it's easier to wrap than keep in a sheath.

Personality: For a huge, monstrous-looking hardened criminal who carries around a sword nearly as large as he is, Kisame is..... actually surprisingly personable. When you get right down to it, he's really one of the nicer, more normal, more psychologically healthy sorts of the Akatsuki, on the inside. Most of the time, he's calm, respectful, and polite, well-spoken and tolerant--he, of all people, is never one to judge people by their looks or first appearances, preferring to let their words and deeds speak for themselves. If you're kind and non-judgmental, then all in all, he tends to be very pleasant company and easy to get along with, a laid-back extrovert who goes with the flow, enjoys company, likes kids, (or child-like behavior, considering Tobi) has a healthily active sense of humor, is willing to just have fun, and appreciates efforts at making things better and brighter.

He cares deeply about and is intensely loyal to his friends, even going so far as to worry over their health and safety, and definitely isn't afraid of taking care of them if the need arises. This care tends to be expressed in actions, rather than words, as Kisame is seldom outright sentimental--nor does he seem to be often caught excessively upset, or sad, or even happy. Though he doesn't seem that way just to look at him, affable as he seems, the man can be surprisingly guarded and hesitant about giving people his trust--because of his looks, Mist upbringing, and his criminal lifestyle--and he doesn't often let people see much of how he feels or what he thinks. Still waters run deep, as they say, and not many get to plumb those depths to any large degree, seeing only a sunny and unruffled surface; if you are one of the few to get below the surface though, the ripples your presence causes go through and through.

Proud but sensible, he's quite capable of taking a stand and speaking his mind, yet willing--if slightly reluctant--to step down and do as he's told, or if it's simply too much for him to handle. He likes to call himself a simple, practical guy, wanting and deserving only that which almost any other man would take for granted as a basic right; unlike so many villains in his world, he has very little in the way of grand plans, high-flying ideology, or great ambitions, instead willing to act on another's orders, furthering their goals, keeping himself in as good a position as possible, and watching how everything unfolds. He knows that his appearance is horrifying and terrifying to many people, and though takes advantage of it for a menacing reputation and to help with his work, he's actually surprisingly sensitive about it; Kisame tries to keep conversation off his looks if at all possible, and usually keeps hidden how much its negative effects, especially socially, hurt him.

Though he usually makes some effort to stay professional while working, he tends to drop his respectful attitude quickly towards people who irritate him, and he does have a bit of a problem (not that he usually considers it as such) with his shark-like instincts getting the better of him every so often. If the smell of blood is too strong, especially when already fighting, he tends to slip into a frenzied bout of bloodlust, attacking with brutal power but little strategy. Quite to the contrary of his normal persona, he's a confident, vicious fighter once the sparks start to fly, who hates being forced to back off before the job is done, and takes a sadistic pleasure in the maiming and mutilation of his opponents, with especial enjoyment in permanently crippling or disfiguring them. Survival of the fittest, after all, condemns those who are brought down unequivocally. On the job like that, he's very much mentally the cold-hearted predator that he resembles, offering and expecting no mercy or quarter, and generally expecting his comrades to take care of themselves if they aren't fighting as a team.

He's a ruthless, implacable foe, and an unwavering, selfless ally. Though far more capable of initiative than people give him credit for on either side of things, he rarely takes pains to make sure people realize this, quite willing to subordinate himself and follow rather than lead when necessary--his superiors need to earn his respect, but once they have, he respects them enough to both follow them, and defy, point out, and attempt to correct any weakness he finds, for their own good . Straightforward as he tends to be in some regards, he usually prefers raw results over appearances, and will do what it takes to ensure that his goals are met, even if it doesn't reflect too highly on him, or if he isn't really acknowledged at all. As long as he gets what he wants, recognition isn't too big of an issue, though he does tend to get annoyed if people utterly forget or gloss over him; after all, being acknowledged as a person is far more important than being recognized as an big contributor to a project.

Being disregarded as a mere monster also rankles him badly. Even if he looks like an inhuman, savage meatshield there to simply provide brute muscle and swift kills, he is in fact an intelligent, thoughtful individual, far more insightful and observant than most realize, or he lets on. One more bit of strategic thinking that people think him incapable of; he's too confident in his own abilities and himself as a person to be bothered by being underestimated. While he's almost always game for a nice conversation, he's quite content to allow for a companionable silence as well, though chances are he's turning something over in his head if he's that quiet; rarely does he lie, but he doesn't volunteer what isn't necessary, either.

Abilities: Most intrinsically, Kisame is not a normal human; his biology is rather extensively tangled up with that of a shark. His skin is covered with dermal denticles, and rough to the touch, while the gills on his cheeks are, in fact, fully functional, allowing Kisame to be essentially amphibious. His eyes possess a full nictitating membrane and tapetum lucidum, and a surprisingly developed lateral line and electromagnetic sensitivity complement sharp hearing and smell, though the former is really nor much use unless he's underwater. He also has rows of razor sharp teeth that periodically regrow; it isn't uncommon to see him lose a few, only to have a full set back within the week, if not sooner.

Kisame also has an obscene amount of chakra, even for an S-ranked ninja--at 30% of his own chakra, he had an amount at least equal to Naruto's while in his four-tailed state, and was capable of fighting toe to toe with Maito Gai--and nearly defeating him, though that was not his intent--after splitting his chakra four ways with clones, reducing him to a mere 7.5% of his ordinary power, defeated only when Gai opened the majority of his Gates.This also implies that his raw strength, speed, and stamina are incredible, and speaks well of his abilities in swordsmanship. His primary elemental affinity is water, while the secondary is earth; he proves to be extremely skilled with water, so far as to even be capable of creating it, which only the most powerful water-users can manage. Aside from this, he's also capable of the skills most ninjas are at his level, and remembers most of them, though not how they were learned.

His most favored weapon is Samehada, a huge, sentient, chakra-devouring sword. If anyone besides him tries to wield it, Samehada's handle erupts with spikes, and it actively seeks to return to its owner. Rather than cutting the way an ordinary sword does, it shaves, tearing with the many razor-sharp scales its surface is covered with. With it, Kisame can devour an opponent's chakra, even going so far as to be capable of disrupting a jutsu in progress, or nullifying one already made.

History: Kisame was born during a frankly somewhat barbaric period in Water Country's history, in the Village Hidden In the Mist, Kirigakure. Civil wars weren't unheard of, bloodline clans stood as weapons to be held onto and used even as they were objects of hate and terror, and newly graduating Academy students were pitted against their own best friends, killing their most precious companions and their emotions for them to further their ambitions and become real ninjas. Kisame was not born to a noble clan, or as the heir of some great and powerful bloodline--he was simply the child of a rather unremarkable pair of ANBU, born as a disconcerting and inexplicable freak, the product of the sort of random mutations that cause bloodlines to develop in the first place.

Fortunately for him, at the time bloodlines were still considered useful, necessary tools of war, (though still an evil, one that at that point had to remain tolerated) and so he was kept alive and raised much as any other child would be. Certainly, there was discrimination, and a damn lot at that--most bloodlines retained human appearances after all. But Kisame was nothing if not a scrappy young man, and though it did foster an intense but well-hidden sensitivity over his looks, (and an equally well-hidden resentment to all but his closest friends, that over the years was fanned very quickly and steadily towards anger and hatred) he also developed a thick skin and a good sense of humor, and learned not to angst or wallow in self-pity. Most importantly of all though, he developed his aggressive streak, not content to be bullied or beaten without fighting back. Big for his age as he was, most of his tormentors recieved a sound thrashing if they tried to tangle with him, and he grew to enjoy the fights he was provoked into wholly more than was healthy, to the point where he had taken his first life before he had even made it into the Academy proper.

He went into Academy at age six, as was usual, and graduated at age ten, a full two years ahead of schedule; at that time, the deadly graduation exams were still in effect, and he fought his best friend to the death in order to claim his title as a ninja. Only two years after this--when he should have been in the graduating class, had he been normal--Zabuza killed the entire graduating class; he met the young murderer then, and a year later the graduation exams had been changed to a more humane system. From then on, Kisame trained hard, shaping himself into an incredible shinobi; he managed to raise himself to the position of Jonin, joining the ANBU and becoming a member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, an elite group which made use of large, unique, and extremely powerful swords.

As the years went by, he became close to the Mizukage, whom he was intensely loyal to--the man was, perhaps, one of the few things that contained his disgust at the way so many people treated him, and that bond was what prevented him from joining in on the plans Zabuza had for a coup d'etat, which ended up failing miserably regardless--as did the Kaguya assault on Kirigakure, which he helped to quell. When he was twenty-two, the Mizukage entrusted him with a dangerous, top secret mission, one which could risk him his life or very allegiance with the village; he was to kill a number of daimyos, all with incredible political power, without betraying that he had been ordered to do so. There was hardly any choice at all to make, really--he valued his bond with the Mizukage far more than he did his connection to the village as an entity, (though he loved his village, a lifetime of mistreatment had made him more than bitter towards many of the people that resided in it) and the challenge was irresistable. His mission was a solid success, marred only by the fact that he was caught--which, if he was perfectly honest, Kisame wouldn't be surprised if that was premediated, too. Further honesty would prove that he would give a surprisingly small damn about that fact, if it were the case--he had been warned, after all, and his Mizukage obviously had his own reasons for such things.

Needless to say, he was exiled as a dangerous criminal, relegated to the status of a missing-nin, though secure in his private knowledge that the Mizukage still found him a useful and trustworthy ally. He was recruited into the Akatsuki mere months after his exile, (about five years after the Kyuubi's rampage) and though it was awkward and a little discomforting, he had little choice but to accept the offer. He was partnered with Uchiha Itachi, a newly recruited thirteen year old with an incredible bloodline of his own, who had slaughtered almost all of his own clan. Orochimaru left the organization soon after, and the pair settled into their life as partners in this new organization, largely staying below the public radar for years with quiet missions, even as the Akatsuki covertly began to gather the jinchuuriki.

His first canon appearance came seven years later, as he and Itachi entered Konohagakure to search for the Kyuubi jinchuuriki, Uzumaki Naruto. He and Itachi were forced to engage with Yuuhi Kurenai, Maito Gai, Hatake Kakashi, and Sarutobi Asuma after being spotted in a dango shop, and after a brief fight where the Konoha-nin were almost entirely ineffectual, they retreated. Soon enough they went to a nearby town where Jiraiya was staying with Naruto, and confronted him at the hotel after Itachi placed a genjutsu over a beautiful woman to distract Jiraiya. Before they could capture him though, Sasuke arrived to challenge Itachi, his brother. Itachi made short work of Sasuke, while Kisame kept Naruto from interfering, and Jiraiya interrupted them once again. They were forced to retreat once more as Jiraiya summoned the stomach of a frog to trap and digest them with, burning a way out with Itachi's Ameratsu.

The pair disappeared off the radar again for nearly four years, returning to canon when the Akatsuki gathered to seal the bijuu they were extracting from Sabaku no Gaara. Gai's team, plus Kakashi, Haruno Sakura, Naruto, and Chiyo were dispatched to go rescue him. To buy them enough time to finish the extraction and sealing process, Pain, the leader of Akatsuki, used a jutsu that turned two of Sasori's subordinates into clones of Kisame and Itachi with 30% of their chakra. These were sent out to delay the teams, Itachi's going to distract Kakashi's team, while Kisame's went to Gai's, to repay Gai for kicking him in the head when they first met. Kisame quickly captured Tenten, Hyuuga Neji, and Rock Lee in water prisons with three water clones, splitting his chakra four ways as he fought Gai to distract and slow him. The battle was close, despite Kisame merely toying with him; Gai was forced to open a large number of gates to defeat the clone, using a high-powered taijutsu, again a kick. Even defeated like that, he and Itachi had accomplished their mission, slowing the teams down enough to seal the Shukaku.

A few months later proved that Kisame and Itachi had been busy once again, tracking down Kisame's assigned jinchuuriki--an old man named Roshi from Iwagakure, who had great control over the demon sealed within him, the Yonbi. Kisame fought him alone at his own insistence, and though the old man was strong and used many extremely rare elemental fusion techniques, he defeated him handily; though a self-admittedly difficult task, Kisame appeared entirely uninjured, only complaining that he was a little tired. Kisame and Itachi brought Roshi back to the Akatsuki, who extracted and sealed the Yonbi from him as well, killing him in the process.

STUFF FROM NEO:
False memories: Kisame was born a normal, healthy young man in the Abyss, in a family struggling just to scrape by. His mother took any and every odd job she could, while his father did physical labor, and occasionally was forced to beat down the less savory types thinking to better themselves by them. They managed by the skin of their teeth to provide Kisame with a rough sort of education, minimal though it was; as soon as he could go no further on their income, Kisame joined his father working and trying to save money, to figure out some way to climb higher and maybe lift himself out of the Abyss someday. His size made him a good worker, and also a good target--consequently, he began defending himself more and more, and developed a taste for the violence the assaults produced, enjoying the brutal beatdown he had the right to return to them. And clearly, since they had attacked him for cash first, there was no reason why he shouldn't take their money and stuff after he pounded them into a bloody pulp.....

Eventually, he came home one night to find their home broken into and looted, and his parents violently killed. It wasn't all that surprising, really, but it was a devastating blow, both emotionally and financially; the most necessary repairs cost nearly everything he had. Working constantly to try and keep himself from starving was wearing down his health too, and there was no way he'd be able to afford any sort of medical care, even if he could have found a doctor in the Abyss..... As terrifying and traumatizing as it was, the Omega capturing him was almost a relief, and almost certainly a lifesaver. While he wasn't treated kindly in the facility, he was at least taken care of, and in comparison to the hellhole he had come from, this was living pretty well. Not to mention the very fact that he'd never really been exposed to anything scientific before--his curiosity dovetailed well with being initially too unhealthy to put up much of a proper fight.

As he returned to a more healthy state and grew more interested in just what was going on, he became less resistant to the strange treatments he was being given. Soon he was cooperative more often than not, trying to talk with the scientists and learn what he could. They weren't especially forthcoming, but even that much provided far more information than he'd ever learned in school. The physical changes he was undergoing..... well, they were quite frankly rather disturbing, and something he wasn't pleased about at all. But as there was little he could do about them, he endured and got used to them as well as he could, trying to make the transitions for himself as easy as possible.

He grew friendly with Madara and Sasuke during his years in the facility, and began shaping up into a respectable fighter; eventually, he was allowed to roam the general public once again, now dutifully employed as a super soldier in reserve. The job came complete with a paycheck and being permitted to stay on Elysium in the laboratories, which is more than fine by him; he knows the normal citizens of such a high class area wouldn't want to look at him, and he wouldn't appreciate enduring their stares any more than he already has to. Not long after he became employed in the government's military itself, he was inducted into the Black Ops branch, given a mask and the codename 'Shark', "courtesy" of his new captain, Kakashi. He likes the job quite well, though he could do without the riffs on his appearance. The company is interesting too, even with administrators like Urd.

((Extra weapons: Far more normal looking--though still a bit strange to just be carried around--would be Tamanami, his chain gun, and Sehou, his.... well, it looks like the love child of a bazooka and a machine gun, save for the fact that there seems to be a mouthpiece on the back instead of a place to load ammunition, and the sight is placed to accomodate the gun being held in that position.

He has less practice with Sehou, but it's a gun specially designed for him; with his capacity for creating water, it acts as a focal point, allowing him to pump water directly through it so it can be pressurized into something far more destructive than it otherwise would be, turning a torrent into a tightly focused stream or quick bullet-like bursts.))

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