[AIM Log] The Hunter and the Hunted [Kiba and Kabumi]

[chicks_dig_dogs]

Kiba, as an Inuzuka, didn't always think before she acted. A lot of times she simply did instead of thinking before doing. Today was really no different.

With everyone else seemingly busy, training or doing work or hanging with family or whatever, she'd struck out on her own, Akako by her side, sort of wandering around the woods near Konoha's edge. During the course of her wandering, she'd caught sight of an animal that looked... well, she thought it looked a bit off. So, being an Inuzuka and figuring there wasn't much else to do and that checking for rabies wasn't really a bad thing, she'd darted off after the animal, Akako by her side.

When she finally stopped in the chase to get her bearings, she realized that she'd dragged herself and Akako out a bit too far and it was getting a bit too late. Sighing softly and rubbing her head, she looked to thehulking ninken beside her. "... should probably go back home now."

Sometimes Orochimayu-sama liked to check up on her, send people to follow her, simply to show she could and to remind Kabumi who her alligence currently belonged to. Depending on her mood at the time she sensed the tail, Kabumi either killed the tail and blamed the incident on being startled or else she deliberately lost the tail and proceeded to hunt it instead. It was so very entertaining when the tail realized that it was the one being stalked.

Kabumi was in a playful mood today--her herb gathering had gone well, and it was much more of a challenge to hunt than simply kill. So she cast one of her favorite genjutsu, which allowed her to become nearly invisible, like a shimmer of hot summer air on the rooftops. And then she crept up into the branches of a tree and headed in the direction of the chakra presence she had sensed.

Grumbling softly at herself, unhappy with how the chase had gone, Kiba carefully slipped onto Akako's back as the large ninken slowly moved back to Konoha. A hand reached out and absently petted the ninken's head as they moved her lips twisted into a frown. Well, today had been a-

Wait.

Both ninken and Inuzuka froze at once, bodies tensing. Slitted eyes flicked around and Kiba twisted slightly, looking all around her in every single direction. She had thought it was her mind playing tricks on her, at first, but with Akako as still and as agitated as she was, she knew there was no mistaking that scent. It was Yakushi Kabumi's and it wasn't faint- it was strong, meaning she was close somewhere.

The question was where?

Now this was interesting. Kabumi stopped about twenty-five meters away from the girl and giant ninken. So it wasn't a tail. But it was one of Hinaji's teammates, and that alone was enough to draw her up short, to stay her hand, for now.

What could she use this girl for?

First, she needed to buy herself a little more time. Kabumi knew enough about the Inuzuka (and remembered more than enough about Hanato) to know that their noses were their greatest strength. She moved to get downwind, leaping from branch to branch, and brought her hands together to create the seal that would mask her scent, make her, for all intents, disappear.

Kabumi had found her first.

Kiba cursed very softly and slipped off Akako. A hand moved to rest on her kunai pouch and she looked around, eyes narrowed. She couldn't see the woman and now she could no longer smell her, only lingering traces of her scent which didn't help her at all. There was a slight breeze which ruffled leaves and things around them and Kiba narrowed her eyes even more. Finding Kabumi could mean the difference between life and death.

With Akako growling softly beside her she filtered nearly everything out and simply looked. It took some time, because she couldn't see like Hinaji, or even like Hoshino but she found what she was looking for. Brushing of leaves that didn't follow the wind blowing and it was hard to see, to follow (because, really, this was Kabumi) but she could see it.

Watching the pattern, fingers curled around a kunai, she suddenly hurled the weapon in Kabumi's direction. It probably wouldn't hit...

...but it get her point across.

Kabumi didn't even bother ducking--she was already crouched down and the kunai went right over her head. So it seemed this little one wasn't entirely stupid, although it had taken quite some time for her to figure out where she was. It had given Kabumi enough time to figure out just what she was going to do with this opportunity.

"You should learn to aim better," Kabumi said, and to prove her own point, she threw six kunai of her own, in a spread out formation designed to hit at least one of the two. As she threw the weapons, she moved--no matter what the skill level of the opponent, staying in the same spot was not advantageous.

With near identical snarls, both ninken and kunoichi moved. Fingers dove into her pouch and Kiba leaped in front of Akako, using a kunai to deflect the ones thrown- she could defend against this, Akako couldn't. And though most were avoided, one slipped past, slicing through her jacket and her shoulder and slicing Akako's leg as well. Kiba hissed but kept the kunai up, eyes darting around, trying to find the woman.

"You should stop being a coward," Kiba growled, heart hammering in her chest. Right now, she wasn't thinking that this was an S-Class ranked medical nin who worked for Orohimayu, or that this woman had thrashed many of Konoha's jounin, or that she was way beyond her league. All she was thinking that this was the stupid psychotic woman that had hurt her brother so much that he had stopped trusting her, had hurt her teammate enough that she still haunted him even now, and had hurt her sensei and nearly killed him, making him stay in the hospital for weeks upon weeks.

She was angry.

Seeing a shimmer in the trees and how it moved, she grinned and hands flashed through seals. With a puff of smoke, Akako became her and both of them leapt forward, trying to catch the glimmer that was Kabumi in a pincer attack.

Quick movement killed the effectiveness of the concealment jutsu, and so Kabumi dropped it as Kiba-and-Akako charged. She continued to mask her scent though, as that would be handy if she chose to use bunshin.

It was almost laughable that the pair was daring to fight her. But the girl was Hanato's younger sister, and honestly she would have been disappointed at anything less. Kabumi dug out a pair of kunai--her chakra scalpels could best the Inuzuka claws, but why end the fight so quickly?--and dove toward the dog-human hybrid on her right. A pincher attack wasn't nearly as effective unless both halves of the pincher hit at the same time.

It was almost scary, how both versions of Kiba grinned at the same time. The real Kiba darted and followed, hurling a handful of shuriken towards Kabumi, knowing they wouldn't hit, but just wanting the distraction. Akako leaped high onto a sturdy branch and poofed back into her canine form, howling and snarling at the silver haired woman even as she was leaping. It an a move they'd perfected time and time again, the ninken spun easily despite her bulk and 'marked' Kabumi.

(Later on, Kiba would say that despite everything, just for that one moment, it was all almost worth it)

Both leaped back and away, before leaping up. Kiba's feet barely touched the ninken's back as her hands slammed through seals and she snarled. "Inuzuka Ryuu Chinjuu Konbi Henge: Soutou Rou!"

The pair were enveloped in a cloud of smoke, but when the smoke clear, they were rather impressive. The double headed wolf was something Kiba had worked on again and again after the fight with Sakon and Ukon. She could hold it far longer now and planned on using that to her advantage. The growl from the two almost seemed to make the ground shudder and drool was already leaking out of their mouth's and making the ground muddy and slippery. It may have been a bit heavy handed for so early in the battle but this was Kabumi and she needed to be taken out fast.

Kiba's rumbled out, infused with Akako's dangerous growl as they readied themselves. "You're ours."

Many things had happened to Kabumi during fights. Being peed on by a dog wasn't one of them. She had been expecting sharp claws and teeth, not the scent of urine.

She leaped back as Kiba started shouting a jutsu and resisted the sudden urge to start scratching her skin. It was--was it acidic? It was starting to burn, and it made sense if it was--what advantage was there to urinating on an opponent unless the urine actually did something?--but she had a bigger problem to deal with as the cloud dispersed.

Quite literally.

"I'm no ones possession, Kiba-chan," Kabumi said with a smile, not the least intimidated by the drooling white canine. She didn't know a great deal about the specifics of a dog's anatomy, much less a giant two-headed dog's anatomy. But she knew enough. And while the increased size undoubtedly brought increased strength, it also enlarged vulnerable areas and would severely decrease the beast'smaneuverability in tight spaces. "Least of all yours."

The girl was far too arrogant, but Kabumi could use that. It wasn't good to pass up on opportunities.

"GAOURGA!"

There was no hesitating, there was no taunting or teasing. She just turned into a deadly whirlwind of destruction, roaring loud and aimed straight for that scent. Kabumi slipped out of the way and it took a second or two to spin around but then she was right after the sound medic. There was a substitution jutu, but Kiba and Akako had already turned sharply to find her. Kiba couldn't see her but she was going to kill her, she was going to strike the woman and tear her into pieces and-

Where the hell had her scent gone?!

The ground! Akako groaned in her ear and she slipped out of the spin and to the ground, gigantic paws digging at dirt, trying to claw and drag out the traitor. "You whore! You coward, come out!"

It was too sudden. Kabumi's scent reappeared- behind her- and almost simultaneously, pain flared in her, their, rear leg and the whole back started to collapse. Panicking momentarily, she released the jutsu, using the smoke to possibly cover her and Akako. She tried to get up but there was a horrendous pain in her left leg and she fell right back to the ground. Horrified, and starting to realize the grave she had dug for herself, she looked back to her leg, grabbing at it. There was no outward marks, but it simply wasn't working. Akako moved swiftly out of the smoke towards Kiba, barking sharply at her. Her own back leg was dragging slightly, but she had three to support her, not one.

Kiba was not the brightest at times. But she knew, barely able to walk and unable to do her strongest move, that if she didn't run she was going to die, or worse. Hurriedly apologizing to Akako as the dog picked up the back of her jacket in her teeth, hauling her to her feet, she started to run back towards Konoha. Trying not to whimper at the pain in her leg, she shoved Akako ahead, feeling the first inklings of fear.

Well. If she couldn't kill Kabumi, maybe she could lead her to Konoha and someone else could.

No matter how powerful a technique, it wasn't very effective if the person using it was stupid. But now Kabumi had the little Inuzuka on the run--on the limp, rather--and the Sound nin was ready to give her a purpose.

And if the Inuzuka objected to the purpose, well, that's where the application of leverage came in. Surely the little girl wanted her dog to make it back with her.

But first, it was time to disorient the girl more than pain could. Kabumi decided to not try to mask the scent of the acid piss. It would take water to dilute it, lots of it, and while the burning was annoying it wasn't going to be a serious flesh-eating problem for quite some time. It would have been a different story if it had gotten on more sensitive tissue, like her eyes, but it wasn't anything a little regeneration couldn't deal with for now. And besides, if she left it like it was, she knew the girl would know exactly where she was. And where she was not.

It took little effort to get within sight of the limping Inuzuka and ninken. "Going somewhere?" Kabumi asked. "I wasn't finished with you." Then she clasped her hands together in a simple sequence of seals.

Damn. Damn. Kiba flinched, both at the woman's voice and at the pain shooting up and down her leg. She redoubled her efforts and forced herself to run faster despite the fact that it wasn't really possible, with whatever Kabumi had done to her leg (what had she done, how had she done, dammit it hurt to run like this). But she forced herself to move faster anyway, eyes barely cutting back now and then. If Kabumi could see her, could see them (because Kiba could sure as hell smell her) why hadn't she just killed them yet?

Oh yeah. Because she was crazy and liked to play games, duh.

Akako glanced back at her once, growling questioningly, a slight hint of pained whine in the noise. Kiba growled back to her, not really saying anything but conveying her answer with bared teeth and posture. However, she didn't give any indication that she'd heard Kabumi, not bothering to answer the woman's statement. There was no point and at this point, her breath was better spent on running and not a verbal sparring match with the med nin behind her. At least, not yet. Verbally harrasing her in return might distract her slightly, just enough to get her close to Konoha, where someone else could (hopefully) see and help.

Of course. It was also hard to respond to someone when they were constantly changing their position. Kiba growled low in her throat eyes swinging around before he nose caught up with the substitution jutsu.

She just had to get to Konoha. She just had to get to Konoha, and bring Kabumi with her, so someone could kill the traitor.

Kabumi wasn't close enough to see the signs of fear and panic, but she knew enough to guess that they were there. The girl had to know she was being toyed with, and the suspense about when the game would end would increase the longer the game extended. Especially when the stakes were raised.

"The problem with poisoned weapons," she said, "is that they are so very tricky to handle." The conversation didn't have to be logical. In fact, the more jumps in logic, the more likely it was that the Inuzuka would get off balance. And confusion only augmented terror. "You're as likely to stick yourself as your enemy." She translocated again, this time high up into the trees, but still within sight and speaking range.

"Doesn't she ever shut up," Kiba growled, more to herself then anything. She told herself that Kabumi was trying to scare her, that she worked on terror because Kiba knew thatlogically . Chances are there was no poison at all, she was just screwing with her head. But before she could stop herself, he hand came up and pressed to her arm where she'd been cut earlier, feeling the drying blood on her jacket and over her skin.

What made her throat really tighten though and what made the fear spike a bit, was that Akako had been hit too. Slitted eyes darted to the blood staining the white fur and she swallowed thickly.

It was a lie, it had to be.

She let the grin on her face leak into her voice. "Hi no Kuni has a much better growing season for some herbs." Kabumi translocated again, and then she was running parallel to the Konoha kunoichi. "It's practically an apothecary for poison."

In one fluid motion she reached into her thigh holster and flung four kunai at the girl and dog and then disappeared again.

She had a choice. Either she could defend herself, or defend Akako. Though really, it was never choice to her.

Fingers of her uninjured arm dove into her kunai pouch and she hurled two kunai, praying they would work. As she hoped, she knocked two away from Akako and managed to hit another, but the fourth slipped past. She couldn't help the yelp as the weapon stabbed into her arm and she hissed pulling it out and hurling into the ground. There was a slight stumble as her hand clasped the injured area, feeling the blood seep beneath her fingers.

Kabumi's plan to frighten her was very much working.

"Surely you can do better than that," Kabumi said. It was the perfect Academy-sensei intonation, the sort of voice that she'd heard during her entire lackluster stint at the Academy. But this time the kawarimi had taken her to a new position entirely, one that placed the dog between Kabumi and the girl. "Why don't you try again?"

Up the danger, increase the pressure, attack what was vulnerable and precious. Kabumi had seen glimpses of how much Hanato's dogs were valued; undoubtedly the sister would feel the same.

It wasn't fair to send five kunai this time, but Kabumi was anything but fair.

For a moment, Kiba didn't know what to do. She had put distance between her and Akako on purpose, but now it was a hindrance. There was no way she could get to-

... oh wait, she could kawarimi too.

Dropping her hand from her injured arm, her hands flashed through seals as fast as possible. Just in time, she got in the way to protect her limping ninken. It meant another kunai to her injured arm and another yelp at the pain, but it meant Akako was safe. Her eyes lifted from her wounds to Kabumi, glaring hatefully at the woman. But she hadn't let Akako get hurt and she wasn't going to let her get hurt and nor was she gonna let this woman win.

Her fingers squeezed her wounded arm tighter. She was starting to lose feeling in it, or maybe that was just her mind playing tricks on her, it had to be. She quickly averted her gaze from Kabumi, not willing to show her fear to the traitor.

It seemed that even the slower dogs could pick up on tricks.

Even though she couldn't see the girl's face, Kabumi could see the way the Inuzuka gripped her arm, over the wound. "It should be going numb by now," Kabumi said, "or it will soon. This herb acts rapidly."

Despite what most thought, Kabumi was very interested in the truth. That was her job--to find it, uncover it, to root out even the darkest truths in someones heart. It required a lot of deception, but that was only because few dared to wear the truth out for all to see. Truth and lies could be usedinterchangeably, were always interchangeable, so long as one knew which was which. The only time it became a danger was when one didn't know, or forgot.

"The numbness will spread through your body." Kabumi translocated again, but instead of to the sides or behind, she planted her appearance directly in the way of the beeline the Inuzuka and her dog had been making. Time to see if this choice in direction was deliberate or unconscious. If it was deliberate, it would be very interesting to play with.

It wasn't in her mind.

It really was poisoned.

Fear choked Kiba for a minute before she shook her head and gritted her teeth and kept moving. Her leg was protesting furiously but she was a shinobi and she was an Inuzuka and she'd be dammed before she'd let this woman scare her into stopping or slowing. But her arm really was going numb and it was slowly becoming useless dead weight. Coupled with her limping, it was slowing her down no matter how hard Kiba tried to run.

Her eyes narrowed at the woman in front of her and she snarled. Her hand dove into her shuriken pouch and she hurled them at Kabumi in a sharp arc, hoping to at least nick her as Akako and her dove out of the way and then back on their path.

She just needed to get her to Konoha, just a little farther. Had she really gone this far out?

For a second it looked as if the shuriken had hit, but then there was a cloud of smoke and a log fell to the forest floor. Kabumi took a second to orient herself in her new position on a wide tree limb. It was just the right spot to see how sharply her prey returned to their original path.

So the little dog was on a mission. Kabumi wasn't stupid--if they kept going on this line they would run into Konohagakure. Whether it was a decision made to get to help or to lure her, it didn't matter. She'd promised Orochimayu that she wouldn't get caught this time, and one didn't break promises to the Sannin lightly. "You should be grateful for the numbing, because you would be agony when the poison starts affecting your organs."

Kabumi shifted positions again, faster now. She didn't always finish a thought between switching, going faster and faster as she spoke. "Luckily you don't need your appendix--" to the right, in the trees "--it will burst. You'll start vomiting so violently--" left, on the ground "--that you'll choke up pieces of your stomach lining. Your kidneys--" directly behind "--will begin to bleed--" ahead, to the left, diverting her northward "--and your brain matter will eventually reach theconsistency--" up in the trees this time "--of miso soup."

Did she know? She couldn't know. But what if she did?

If there had been another Inuzuka, they would have been stricken fearful themselves by all the fear that was rolling off Kiba. Her arm was completely numb, her leg screaming in pain and she was mad at herself because she hated being toyed with and she hated being weak and she hated not being able to protect Akako. But Kabumi kept moving and not even her superior scent could tell where she was or where she was going to end up. The words came from all around her and she squeezed her arm tighter, swallowing thickly.

No.

She wasn't going to let the fear rule her, she couldn't. Couldn't let Kabumi win.

"It can't kill me," she panted out even as she ran, eyes darting around. "You gone soft Kabumi. You haven't killed anyone lately. You're just making shit up, aren't you?"

There were very few times that Kabumi had experienced a paradigm shift. It wasn't the Inuzuka's defiance that made it feel as if the medic had stopped her own heart. "You haven't killed anyone lately."

That was not something a student whose sensei was dead should say.

The game was over.

Before the question was actually finished, Kabumi was moving. The kawarimi allowed her to materialize right behind the girl. In a flash Kabumi grabbed the girl's good wrist, yanking her hard and fast around and down to land face first in the dirt.

It happened before Kiba had time to think, or even react. Kabumi's scent was suddenly there and her hand was on her wrist, all but hurling her to the ground. She tried to brace her leg to stay upright, but of course her leg wasn't working and she went down. Her good leg tried to push her up but Kabumi pinned her hard and continued to hold her good arm. Her numb one couldn't find purchase to push her up and she realized in the back of her mind, that if she got out of this alive, this was a scenario she was going to have to talk to her family about.

Akako, at seeing her master go down and threatened with a kunai skidded, as if she was going to turn to help Kiba. Snapping back to the present she barked out sharply and forcefully. "Run!"

The dog hesitated, unused to such an order, to leaving Kiba. But the girl barked again "RUN!" and she turned and sped off, whimpering and whining. She would get help. Kiba would be alright.

Kiba couldn't say anything else as the ninken ran, practically eating dirt and trying to spit it out as Kabumi crushed her face into the ground.

It was happening again. Kabumi could feel the her blood begin to surge at the memory of him. Yuuhi Kureno, with his smug face and his burning flowers and his violation of her mind. Her mind. "He's alive?" It came out a hiss, and then she realized the question was ambiguous. It could refer to either Yuuhi or Hanato--it should be both--and the ambiguity made her furious enough to take it out on the girl beneath her. "Yuuhi?" She ground her knee into the small of the Inuzuka's back.

Kabumi knew the whites of her eyes were changing, knew that she was dangerously close to losing any semblance of control. Here, alone, she didn't have to care about that. It was just her and the girl, no cover to keep, no Orochimayu to chide her. Her fingers tightened on the girl's wrist, crushingly hard.

Kiba gave a pained sound as her wrist was squeezed to the point she was surprised something didn't pop. Her good leg tried to shift and dig into the ground and arch herself up to roll Kabumi off her but the woman slammed her knee into her back and shoved her back down. With only one leg working and her good armed pinned painfully, she could only squirm unhappily underneath Kabumi. Everytime she breathed harshly, dirt was blown out and she spit a few times, trying to get rid of the grit in her mouth.

"What," she coughed out, eyes shifting to try and see Kabumi (oh god were her eyes red what the hell she was going to die what the hell was wrong with this woman), "you actually thought you killed him?"

She'd thought that Sasoriza had killed him. He had been safely buried in her mind, with any secrets he'd gleaned from her head. Yuuhi had been looking for information on Hinaji's seal, she knew he had obtained some of it, but she didn't know how much of it. If he knows it's a prototype--

The temptation to get back at Yuuhi, in some small way, was intoxicating, nearly to the point of overwhelming her. Surely the death of a student would be devastating for him. She almost smiled, envisioning the look on Hinaji's face when the Hyuuga found out that she really had killed someone he cared about. It would be devastating for Hanato to, but that was collateral damage she was willing to incur. It would be so easy, just turn her wrist a little and press the edge of the kunai right into the vein there...

But simply leaving a chuunin for dead in the middle of the forest would end things too quickly. Her intellect warred with her blood for a long moment as she stared down at the girl's face. Which desire needed to be satisfied more?

Kabumi twisted her wrist.

Kiba was slightly proud of herself. She managed to only make a strangled groan instead of a cry as Kabumi snapped her wrist.

She gasped for air at the pain, starting to squirm all over again. The worst part was the waiting, the silence. Tears pricking at her eyes, she watched Kabumi through the haze, watched how she looked at her, calculating and cold. She wasn't a person to the med nin, she was a thing, an experiment, something that meant absolutely nothing. And at this point, the Chuunin was very sure that she was going to die right here and now. Akako would make it, of that she was sure.

And all she could think was that her father be so disappointed in her for dying like this.

Kabumi gave the wrist a final, spiteful squeeze, holding it for several seconds. Before the red in her eyes fully faded, she leaned down. Her whisper was harsh and low, the closest a non-Inuzuka could ever come to a true growl. "I never forget."

Her other hand twitched so that the kunai's edge just barely bit into the skin of the girl's throat. "Tell them that. All of them." If Kabumi was going to send a message, she might as well deliver one for three recipients even if the message was meant in different ways. And in case the girl was slow, she pressed the kunai a little further with each name. "Yuuhi, Hanato, and Hinaji. I never forget."

Kiba wasn't exactly the smartest person ever. And the urge to say she wasn't telling anyone anything was incredibly strong. But she knew that if she did, Kabumi would slice her throat within the blink of an eye. She could feel that kunai pricking her throat at each name and she wondered if that would make the poison spread to her brain quicker.

But before she had a chance to respond or even really think, Kabumi was gone. For a moment, Kiba continued to just lay there, eyes wide and breath moving dirt. She maneged to remind herself to inhale deeply, and the acidic smell of piss was gone. But she laid there for even longer, just waiting for Kabumi to come back and kill her. But as the words she'd hissed finally filtered through, she realized that Kabumi wasn't going to kill her- she was going to use her as a messenger.

Right now, though, Kiba wasn't really thinking about that. Her arm was numb, her wrist was broke and her leg wasn't working and she may or may not have been poisoned with something something that would make her innards explode like she'd been hit with the Jyuuken. Carefully, with tiny whimpers of pain, she got to her hands and knees, and then slowly to her feet- or foot, as it was. Her slitted eyes rolled around, half expecting the woman to just flip out and suddenly chop off her head or something. But minutes passed and Kabumi didn't return, nor did her scent, nor did any trace of her.

Frightened and sick, Kiba turned and limped back to Konoha as fast as her battered body would let her.

She didn't want her brain to turn into miso soup, after all.