You Ain't Scared Of No Man
WHO: Hotsuma, Maka, Soul, open to Shuuichi and the curious
WHAT: Following a run-in with the Boogeyman, Hotsuma decides to GET TO DE CHOPPAH let Maka visit the sighting location and see what she can find.
WHERE: The Jungle, in a clearing south of the river.
WHEN: 8:45 PM
Meters above the jungle floor, Hotsuma strode across a tree's spindly branch as if it were the widest of city avenues. He knelt at its trunk and saw where moonlight glinted off the last of the kunai he'd thrown partway through dinnertime. Impaled on it was a tropical caterpillar, its legs still twitching in a series of reflexive death throes. The shinobi brushed this off a tad ruefully before returning the blade to his forearm guard. His aim was as impeccable as always, but hunting caterpillars had been the farthest thing from his mind.
Brown eyes tried to pierce the benighted treetops around him. Hotsuma's sighting of that clawed phantasm was about fifteen minutes into the past. He knew what he'd seen. But to this moment he wasn't sure of what. At best it was a man in a cloak with a taste for theater and the most common of scare tactics. At worst... who could really tell in this land where the flows of magic were strong and watching gods held much sway?
He felt a weak tingle of ice down his spine that he recognized as fear. Not so much for himself than for those he'd come to be concerned about. And yet with that fear and wariness of the unknown came... a thrill that surprised him very much. Shadow warriors like himself were used to being the monster in the dark. That thing whispered about by grown men over liquor in well-lit rooms. Whatever it was he'd seen and chased, it had outwitted him. He couldn't help but acknowledge the phantasm as worthy prey.
A rustling of foliage at the clearing's edge brought him out of his thoughts. He leaped down and landed softly, let the moonlight identify him clearly for whoever had come.