Nightshift 42: Bill's Hardware

[ruthless_hunter]

[from here]Lockdown kicked the door to the hardware store down and barged in. There was already a zombie in here, a big one, who the bounty hunter guessed was the owner of the store. There were also two other zombies with him, so Lockdown was already outnumbered. But that had never stopped the bounty hunter

Comments

[see_my_back]

Things had cooled at least a little after lunch when they'd stopped by the hardware store. There was plenty to do and plenty of things to look at, not to mention deciding on their strategy for lifting some of the more useful items from the shop without the owner noticing. There were knives, kept behind glass of course, saw blades, which weren't quite shurikens, but would work in a pinch, as well as some axes and gardening equipment, though none of those were too practical.

Sakura kept near Sasuke, close enough that he wasn't out of her sight, but far enough to give him room to peruse the shop undisturbed. She wasn't sure she could handle another of his tantrums. Just as she was looking through a nice selection of awls, she sensed something decidedly strange. As if a sudden genjutsu had been placed, sloppily and abruptly around them, but if it were an illusion, she'd know, wouldn't she? And what about Sasuke?

She picked up a couple of the awls, noticing with some annoyance that the store had suddenly become old-looking and rotted. At least the metals hadn't rusted over. She pocketed them, glancing up to see that the clerk had also been affected. Not good.

"Sasuke-kun," she stepped closer, voice hushed. "Something's happened. I think... the night affects this place early. Everything's rotted. The people too." Dammit.

On the positive side, if the clerk was some rotted up corpse, it meant he probably wouldn't mind so much if they took some of the equipment. Where were the saw blades again? She kept a lookout for any threats. It looked like a couple of the customers had turned just as rotted and disgusting as the clerk. And unfortunately, it wouldn't be long until they were headed this way.

"They're coming," she said quietly, eyes darting up and down the aisles for feasible weapons.

[sasuke_of_sound]

Although Sasuke had grown somewhat accustomed to the strange outfit throughout the day, he'd actually neglected to consider the problem of shoes. Or, rather, he'd forgotten the convenience of being able to sense differences in the ground with his bare feet -- as a result, when the wood of the floor began to rot, he didn't really notice at first. It wasn't until the distinct smell of mildew rose to his nose that he realised that night had fallen over the town.

He was less surprised than he might have been had they not been caught unawares on the buses during that first trip -- frankly, Sasuke was more concerned about Sakura's reaction at first, focusing on listening to where he'd noted her last. She didn't seem particularly shocked by it, either, which was good. It would have been irritating to deal with squeamishness.

... and apparently, the townspeople became monsters at night as well. Sasuke had wondered whether they were the same as the staff at the Institute; clearly, they were. In other words, the patients couldn't count on any allies outside the Institute at all. Sasuke was more than a little grateful that he'd already been stashing nails and wire in as many parts of his clothes as he could manage.

"Grab anything you can carry and use," he muttered. From here he could already hear the sounds of conflict, first outside and then -- bursting straight into the store. Without hesitating too long Sasuke took a step back to where he remembered having passed gardening implements, hand trailing over the handles until he found a stout, solid-feeling one. A quick feel-over revealed a shovel: good enough.

It sounded like whoever had broken in just now was keeping the staff busy for now, but Sasuke tested his chakra by flickering into Sharingan for a moment. Yes, night shift had definitely begun; chakra was available again. He kept the doujutsu activated just long enough to ascertain that Sakura was to one side of him and two unknown blurs of chakra were engaging the by-now familiar smears of monster chakra by the door.

"We should take advantage of this and explore the town more closely," he decided. They probably had a minute before they could leave, so if Sakura wanted to voice objections she could in the time.

... Sasuke also decided to make use of it by ripping the stupid chains off of his pants. They'd be a damn hindrance, and there was no point in keeping them if his nurse was going to be too busy trying to kill him to deafen him with scolding.

[see_my_back]

Whether the enemy was dead or alive, it hardly mattered. There were enough forbidden jutsu to do it, but on this kind of scale? It only took seconds for Sakura to calculate just how outnumbered the patients would be. If this was happening all over town, there had to be thousands of living dead. She and Sasuke might have a bit of trouble, but she had confidence in her abilities. Others, however, wouldn't be escaping intact, that much she was almost sure of. There'd been children, and so many others who'd no skill in fighting whatsoever. Maybe there was some merit to Sasuke's theories. Something like this was certainly a way to narrow down the patients and find out which ones had any abilities worth investigating. Or a good way of wiping everyone out. Great.

Sasuke didn't have to tell her to gather supplies, she was already equipping herself with as much as she could feasibly carry. The smaller sawblades went in her baggy front pockets and a couple of smaller hand-axes went on her belt. And thankfully, a nice pair of leather gloves for punching the hell out of their new enemies. They were a little dusty, but had survived well enough. She remembered seeing some knives up front as well, behind the clerk's counter. Not a sword by any stretch of the imagination, but they'd work with whatever they could find. They'd had plenty of time to evaluate what equipment would be useful, now it was more or less a free-for-all.

"I'm ready," she told him, taking a running start and nailing the nearest rotting human with her boots. It made a disturbing squishing noise, but it wouldn't be the strangest enemy she'd ever faced.

"There's some knives behind the counter on the way out, but if we don't hurry, we're going to be overwhelmed. There's more of them coming in the door!" Luckily, while the creatures were many in number, they had little actual skill. They were slow, they were obvious, and that made them easy targets. But just like with Naruto's kage bunshin, sheer numbers could overwhelm just about anyone, even if they were weak.

With a grunt, she used her momentum and jumped up onto the front counter and kicked in the glass a second later. There were more of the undead coming in through the front and she picked up a short gerber and nailed one in the head, dropping them to the floor. She picked up one with a slightly longer blade as she crouched to kick a second monster in the face. Gross, definitely; almost reminded her of some of the weird clones they'd faced in the forest during their chuunin exams.

[sasuke_of_sound]

Sasuke had already heard the commotion at the door -- and beyond that, smelled the familiar stench of decay and dirt, something he hadn't realised he'd gotten accustomed to in Sound until he'd woken up here -- but Sakura's warning confirmed it. Sasuke hefted the shovel until he'd found the right balance, recalled the layout of the shop, and ran towards the door.

There was the particular sound of impact on rotting flesh to one side, which he deduced was Sakura doing rather better than he'd expected. Sounded like that had been enough to take it out, though -- nothing difficult, then. Sasuke dodged out from the shelves and activated the Sharingan for the pattern of fighting he'd been forced to develop here: a moment, a flash of bright chakra, memorizing locations, and then darkness again. It was probably a good thing these creatures seemed to be consistently making a weird moaning noise.

He took stance and closed his eyes to better focus on sounds: Sakura was by the counter and holding her own for now, but there were two more headed her way and a veritable crowd starting to fill the entrance. Sasuke stepped between the smashed counter and the oncoming two, smashed in the head of one -- walking dead? whatever the hell they were -- and kicked the other back, removing the immediate threat.

And kept pressing them back towards the mass at the front, taking out the second with another swing. Apparently shovels were more handy than Sasuke might have suspected through all those D-ranks of his team days.

"Any windows?" He tossed over his shoulder, jabbing the business end of the shovel towards the closest moaning sound and assuming that she'd understand the possibility of escaping by smashing one open.

[see_my_back]

She hadn't seen Sasuke in action much during the night, but he was pulling his fair share so far as she was concerned. A window did seem like the best escape route since so many of the dead were coming through the front. Though the store might also have a back door, there were plenty of windows. Surprising really, that the monsters hadn't broken through them already.

It would be best if they could hurry to one of the windows furthest from the door. That seemed to be relatively clear.

"Follow my lead," she replied, folding the knife and tucking it into her pocket before jumping from the counter and running toward the far right front side of the store. Luckily, there were plenty of heavy objects to be found and Sakura picked up a big metal wrench, adding a bit of her chakra to the throw as she hurled it at the window. It shattered, leaving only a few ragged pieces of glass at the bottom and another large opening that would soon be occupied by more of their slow-moving opponents.

Another kick kept one of the undead at bay, knocking him into one of the aisles and clearing a path to their escape. Sasuke would've heard the crash of the window, she was certain, so she didn't pause for more than a moment before jumping through the hole she'd left.

[[to here]]