Sky on Fire: Slow Burn - Chapter 10 (Part 3)
Title: Slow Burn
Chapter: 10 Misjudged (Part III)
Author/Artist: Skylar Inari
Pairing: Yamanaka Ino/Nara Shikamaru
Theme: 05 - Your precious someone
Word Count: 8268
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. AU immediately after the Sasuke Retrieval Arc. Part 10 of ? Unbeta'd.
---
I found a way out.
The words echoed around in her head, taking Megumi a few moments to put them together, and when she did, her hands tightened on the hard bed, digging against the stone only to find it didn’t really affect it.
Ino-kun’s hand on her cheek felt rough and a bit ragged. She focused on that, as she tried to think of a way to say something that would get her more information without alerting their watchers. Even as hurt as she was, she knew they had to be present.
“I’m awake,” she said soothingly, even though it hurt. “Is there any water, Junko-chan?”
“There’s a bit,” Ino-kun said, almost apologetically as she slid away to get the water. “I was thirsty, so there’s not as much as there was. But there should be enough. I’m so glad you’re back.”
Megumi nodded, closing her eyes and thinking as furiously as the pain in her body would allow her. There was a way out, Ino-kun had found it, but going from the condition of her hands, Megumi could guess that it wasn’t the easiest way out. (There was never an easy way out.) The knowledge, though, that they could get out was one she was glad to know.
(It made hope easier to grasp.)
She slowly pushed herself into a seated position, careful of her injuries, and even so feeling a few of them open to bleed sluggishly. They stung, but she had felt worse, had worse, and there was a way out.
Ino-kun too, she knew, would be able to help. Even just in training, as she’d read in Ino-kun’s file, the girl wasn’t bad at medic training. Not, it had read, spectacularly skilled-that was the Hokage’s apprentice, everyone agreed-but talented enough that, had she the inclination, she’d have made a decent medic nin. It hadn’t taken Megumi long, upon meeting the girl, to see why she hadn’t gone for it, and why Hokage-sama hadn’t pushed for it.
At fourteen, it was already obvious that the girl was ill-suited to a life spent healing.
A hiss of pain escaped her, and while she could’ve held it in, there was no point when they were, for all intents and purposes supposed to be civilians.
“I’ve got the water, Onee-sama,” Ino-kun said, hovering now and looking like she wasn’t sure if she was supposed to hand over the cup, or not, and to all appearances was close to wringing her hands in dismay.
Megumi solved that problem by reaching for it. Carefully, and letting her breath out slowly. “I’ll be okay,” she said soothingly, “it’ll be okay, Junko-chan.” It wasn’t, but it was the sort of thing an older sister would say. And she wasn’t dead yet, though Megumi wouldn’t want to try fighting in her current condition.
Ino-kun bobbed her head, damping a bit of cloth and using it to press against one of the wounds that were bleeding. There was a very real bit of frustration in her eyes. “I wish I could do more for you.”
Because she could do more, and both of them knew it. If not for the guards, the silent watchers, who were keeping an eye on everything they said and did...
“You’re doing enough just by being here,” she said, shifting so the injury was easier for her to access. Ino-kun’s eyes dropped as she sighed. Megumi sipped at the water, grateful for it even if it wasn’t the best quality. Water was precious. “I don’t want you to wind up like this.”
And worse yet, if she were caught using chakra.
Ino-kun’s voice was quiet. “I know, Onee-sama.”
There was silence then, but for the pained noises she let past her lips and the soft slosh of water and the rag, she didn’t know where Ino-kun had gotten it, but that didn’t matter. Once they got away from here, it would be simple enough to get rid of many of the cuts.
At Ino-kun’s age, and remembering what had been noted about her chakra levels in the file, Megumi doubted that she had the strength to take care of all of the injuries, not in one go, but there were ways to dull the pain, even still.
Eventually the wounds were cleaned as well as they could be considering the circumstances, and they settled on the pallet together, for all the world looking like they were just two sisters huddled miserably together with a blanket around their shoulders.
In a way, that was correct. They just weren’t sisters. Under the cover of the blanket, and hoping the relative darkness would cover everything else, Megumi took the time to inspect Ino-kun’s hands. Ripped up, and tender, she felt, but didn’t hear, the flinch Ino-kun gave at that.
Sore then; she could sympathize. The way the skin was rent through gave her an idea for how Ino-kun had been moving. With a bit of a sigh, she carefully inspected Ino-kun’s knees. It earned her a bigger flinch, but still no sound.
Megumi left off her inspection, there was no point in bringing more pain around when they had quite enough to share already. “It’ll be alright, Junko-chan,” she said soothingly. Her fingers found Ino-kun’s bare arm and traced out, in shinobi sign language, very simply: Where?
It had to be in this room.
Ino-kun sighed, looking like she was relaxing slightly, even as her eyes fell shut to further cover the gleam in them. “It’d be better if there was a window,” Ino lamented. “So we could at least see the light. It’s scary, Onee-sama, the dark.”
Her lips curved slightly. There was her answer-not precise, of course, but a good enough of one. It was in the wall opposite of the door. “Close your eyes, and sleep, little dreamer,” she said, reaching carefully to brush one hand in Ino-kun’s hair, pausing for a moment at feeling the bits of dirt in it, before continuing on. “And if we’re lucky, we’ll be let out soon. We haven’t done anything wrong.”
Ino-kun nodded, falling silent, and Megumi stared into the dark, not looking at the wall, but not avoiding it either, as the Genin by her side fell asleep.
They had a way out. Now they only needed a distraction.
-0-
To anyone watching, he just looked like a man with a cigarette who was sitting languidly on top of the children’s slide in the neatly kept park. He was, in fact, exactly that-so anyone watching wouldn’t be entirely wrong.
They wouldn’t be entirely right either, though.
Asuma took a drag on his cigarette, letting the smoke puff up in neat little circles and returned to his studying of the area. If it hadn’t been that this was the easiest way to look at ease, he’d not have had one. The cravings made it easier to concentrate, but as it was he would have one, but only one, and make it last as long as he could. This was where Shikamaru and Chouji had disobeyed him, this was the starting point from where they’d gone on to find Yuuta and Kobayashi and brought them back.
Which meant, potentially, that it was an entry point back into the complex. Of course he couldn’t look like he was checking out the area, so the cigarette.
A rustling in the grass caught his attention, and held it as the rustling didn’t stop as it got closer to him. Outwardly he still looked completely at ease, but his mind raced, and he casually placed his hand on his thigh-where, not so coincidently he had shuriken available.
There was a squeak, and then another. He listened, almost bemused now, as the mouse-it had to be mouse-squeaked out Kotone’s passcode. With a sigh that was entirely false, Asuma stubbed out the cigarette, tucking the butt into one of his pouches-no need to waste good nicotine-and climbed down the slide. He’d have leapt down, but it was hard, in the growing dark to tell exactly where the creature was.
Once on the ground, it was an easy thing to pretend he’d dropped something and, kneeling to pick it up, was unsurprised when a mouse quickly darted up his arm, coming to rest up on his shoulder.
“Report,” he murmured, straightening up carefully, not wanting to knock the little guy off his shoulder. “Name and allegiance.”
The brush of whiskers against his neck was his first answer. “Dai,” the mouse squeaked, sounding as amused as a mouse could. “Kotone-sama.”
Asuma nodded, shushing the mouse and walking slowly, and easily, towards the wooded area. It was a risk, yes, but he had to get out of clear sight, where anyone walking by would be able to notice that he had something sitting on his shoulder. Aomori-shi had been awash rumours of siblings plotting against the Daimyo, and the last thing he needed--they needed-was rumours of that sort getting fuel like this. He didn’t need to be linked, even in silhouette, to a conspiracy like that.
Not, he thought wryly, as he entered the first bit of greenery, when he was, in fact, mixed up in it already. There was no need to be sloppy though. Not when he’d so recently been on his other students’ for that one.
“Report,” he said, once he had his back to a tree, it didn’t matter that it was damp, just that he wasn’t fully exposed.
Dai did. Asuma found that the longer he listened to the little mouse, the easier it was to ignore the squeaky-undertone and the odd way some of the words were emphasized. It was about what he had suspected--their capture, the way that the mouse had been sent to find help.
And a great deal of added grumbling that if she'd wanted help quicker, Kotone-sama ought to have sent a bigger mouse, or one that had his scent--not, Dai conceded, would it have done much good considering that it had been raining off and on and scents were all but impossible to track.
That got a chuckle, though it wasn't funny. “She did the best she could,” he said quietly.
A cold nose pressed against his neck. “I know,” Dai said, muttering half-heartedly, “best can still be improved on though.”
“You're here now,” Asuma replied, “and so we'll work it out--we'll get them out of there.” He had to believe that, less for Kotone--who was quite able to take care of herself, and had the training to do so--and more for Ino. This was no laughing matter to him.
He didn't want to have to tell her parents that she'd gotten killed on a mission that she shouldn't even have been on in the first place. He shook his head, very slightly, filling his lungs with the damp but familiar scent of sodden leaves and ground so soaked through that it moved under his feet no matter how careful he was in stepping through the loam and accumulated debris of a wooded area.
“Have you been able to pinpoint where they are?” he asked, fingers itching for a cigarette and making himself ignore that urge. Dai had been, when the little mouse hadn't been able to find him, searching through the manor for any sign of where they'd taken the girls.
An affirmative squeak answered that question.
Turning it over in his head, it didn't take long to come to a conclusion--his boys could wait for him a little longer, this was a lead they needed. “Take me,” he said, a dark smile crossing his face.
It was good to be doing something. They went. Asuma on silent feet, picking his way through the undergrowth, and into the grounds. Dai muttering instructions against his neck. Their progress got slower as he slipped into the building, knowing that already he was over-due to return to the hotel, that they'd be concerned, but that now he was here and there was no turning back.
People were still awake--late enough that they were starting to head to their sleeping quarters, but not so late that most of the household was asleep. Careful henges--he was a pot of plants, an ornate curtain complete with bow, a half open door--one of the basic jutsu but used to its fullest capabilities. There was a good reason why it was taught in the Academy--get the kids used to thinking that they could change shape, look like something else, and it used so little chakra that even an Academy student could hold it for a good while.
He could go for days like this, and had, way back in the war. It felt not good, not exactly, but like slipping on an old glove--comfortable. Asuma prided himself on being a good Jounin sensei, but he had never particularly wanted to be one. This, though, he liked.
An hour and a half it took him, henging his way through the complex, avoiding people, avoiding sight, and using as little chakra as humanly possible to sneak through unnoticed--too much chakra and the enemy shinobi would notice for sure. Too little, and the henge wouldn't be solid enough. He didn't need a see-through illusion.
“Down there,” Dai said, nose practically in his ear, and sounding a great deal more respectful than he had before this.
Asuma studied the door, the steps, that lead down into what looked like a cellar in an out of the way part of the grounds. Risking it, right now, with just him was out of the question. Even as the fact that he had to turn back grated on his nerves. His student was past that door.
So were enemy shinobi, and he had no idea how many of them there were.
“Good,” he said, setting the mouse down on the ground. “Get the layout of it, see how many people there are. Wait for me in the park when you're done.”
The mouse nodded, skittering through the tiny space between the floor and door, and was gone.
Asuma, not wanting to linger, began the slow process of getting out of the building. They had a rescue to plan, and now they knew where the girls were.
Time to get moving.
-0-
Asuma-sensei was late.
Nearly three hours now, from when Yuuta-san had said he'd was supposed to check in, and Shikamaru had to focus, again, on the plans he and Chouji were trying to put together--even if they turned out to be useless, it was something to do other than stare at the team of ANBU that had arrived an hour ago.
Their leader, a tall long-haired woman, was talking in a murmur to Yuuta, the other three members of the squad having gone off to get another room--there was no way their poor hotel room could hold nine people--ten, he corrected, when Asuma-sensei got back.
And twelve when they got Ino and Megumi-san out of trouble. Too many people, too many thoughts, what was he thinking again?
Shikamaru gazed around the room-Chouji half asleep by now, getting what rest he could while sitting on the rough carpet of the room, his back against the wall. The two wounded ANBU-Shimako and Kobayashi hadn’t stirred yet, and no wonder, they needed sleep. Yuuta and Kamiya-san, he thought that was her name, paying him no attention.
Fine. Good, even. It gave him more room to concentrate. Except that he couldn’t. It gnawed on his nerves-first Ino and Megumi-san, and now Asuma-sensei hadn’t checked back in.
He was going to focus. Despite all of that, there were still things he could do, and Shikamaru glanced through the notes he’d taken about their current equipment and what they knew for sure that their sensei had. His shadow shifted, spooling out and making the shadows under his legs, where his knees crossed, under his arms, darker. Thicker.
Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, wishing once again that his shadow was better under his control. This mission, of all things, was wrecking havoc on the uneasy state of shadow. His father had warned him of the possibility, Shikamaru had discounted it, figuring that the mission wouldn’t go horribly wrong, and now wished that he had paid more attention to what had been said.
There were times when laziness was the worst route. He’d figured out that his emotions played greatly into it, but meditating wasn’t his strong point-concentrating on a problem, sure, that was no issue, but actually meditating, he had more difficulty with. They didn’t have the time for him to find a good place to lay out and watch the sky until he felt more stable.
He wasn’t going to get more stable, so he was just going to have to deal and keep on moving. Thinking. Acting and reacting. Shikamaru had no interest in being sent home, in disgrace, though that was a mild thing compared to the fact that Ino wasn’t around to scold him.
A smile made his lips twitch as he thought about what she’d say if she saw him doing so little. It’d be loud, and cutting, and probably right-not that he’d admit to it, not out-loud and not to her.
He missed her.
He shook his head, trying to clear it-what sort of maudlin thoughts were those?-as, at the door, a careful sequence of raps was tapped out, one by one, in a very recognizable pattern.
Asuma-sensei.
Scrambling to his feet, shaking sleep from his eyes, sleep he’d been ignoring in favour of fretting, he watched as Yuuta went on silent feet to get the door. That it was knocking and nothing else was a good sign, but he knew the other man had been concerned as time had stretched further and further past the point when he had been supposed to come back.
It was him, however, and while he looked grim, there was the scent of cigarette smoke clinging in the air. He was silent as the door was shut behind him, looking askance at Kamiya. Chouji wide-awake and looking, if you knew him well, disgruntled about the sudden return to full alertness.
“ANBU reinforcements showed up while you were out,” Shikamaru said, filling the silence. “Kamiya-san and her team. They’ve secured the room next to ours.”
Asuma-sensei glanced for confirmation at Yuuta and Shikamaru tried not to let that grate on his nerves. He'd admitted that he'd been acting childish and worse during a mission where lives were on the line, so he couldn't really blame him. His shadow shifted under him, and Shikamaru spent a moment with his attention less on his sensei and more on calming the stupid thing down.
He needed to spend more time with his dad, just to get this under control. The last thing he needed was to run more missions with his shadow reacting to every bump and curve of his temper. Made it hard to lie, even if the lying was even just to himself.
“Good,” Asuma-sensei said eventually, bowing his head to Kamiya-san. “If you could call your team together, I've got a lead with more information forthcoming.”
Chouji perked up at that, as did Shikamaru, and it was amazing how fast the rest of the ANBU assembled in the room, perched on every available surface, and looking both lethal-they had their masks down, Shikamaru suspected it was under orders to kept their identities from getting out, he doubted that Kamiya was her real name-and utterly silent. Creepy.
“In two hours,” Asuma-sensei said, looking mildly amused and Shikamaru didn’t know why, “we’ll be meeting the source in the park on the western side of the target’s location. Our source may be a bit late, the distances are a bit much at his size, but he’s absolutely Konoha-loyal, and furthermore, loyal to Amaya-san.”
Yuuta was smirking now. “Dai got a hold of you?”
Dai? Shikamaru put that thought on hold while Asuma-sensei nodded. “That’s what took so long-he took me in to do preliminary scouting, and as we speak is trying to get in further to see if he can better pin-point their location. He’ll have an update in a few hours.”
“Should we continue to patrol?” Chouji asked, breaking the silence.
“No,” he said, “you’ll be coming with us.” He didn’t look happy about it either.
“Is that wise?” Kamiya-san interjected. “They’re green, and this is a retrieval mission.”
Shikamaru held his breath, Chouji beside him doing the same. He didn’t know why Asuma-sensei was letting them in on the mission-he, at least, had certainly not been behaving anything like he was supposed to be, and this should’ve been... a prime time to leave him out of things. He wanted to go though.
“Because,” Asuma-sensei said, a frown crossing his face. “They’ll never stop being green without experience. And... if they’re hurt, the boys are the ones that know her the best. She’ll be less likely to freak out if she’s past the point of being able to fully recognize help.”
Shikamaru’s heart settled in his chest, tight and cold.
Kamiya-san’s ANBU mask gave nothing of her feelings away. But she nodded. “It’ll be up to you to keep yourselves alive,” she said crisply, glancing at him and Chouji. “We’ll help if we can, but from the sounds of it, we’ll be dealing with a lot of things at once. If you can’t keep up, stay here.”
They nodded. Shikamaru knew that what he was thinking, and what Chouji was thinking was the same--they'd keep up, come hell or high water.
-0-
Cool air prickled along his arms, raising goosebumps on the bare skin. The wind carried the weight of rain, blowing the leaves on the trees upside down so that their pale undersides were shown. Shikamaru made sure his hair was tied back securely-one thing that both him and Ino shared before a mission, the need to tie back their hair-and flexed his hands. The playground they were in looked less amusing, and more ominous in the dark.
Around him, his shadow blotted out the ground. Asuma-sensei gave it a long glance, but said nothing, his face set and determined. Chouji to his right, looking almost serene, and the ANBU-Kamiya-san’s team, Yuuta and the others remaining at the hotel-faded into the background but for their masks. Pale smudges in the darkness, ominous in their expressionless features.
Shikamaru looked away from them, and shifted uneasily. They creeped him out, and that was the whole point of ANBU. To be nightmarish-taking the hardest, dirtiest missions, and doing them no matter what the mission was about. He couldn’t imagine doing that.
He had enough trouble with his nightmares already. Something else to talk to his dad about when they got back with Ino.
A rustling noise in the grass had them all snapping to attention.
“It’s Dai,” Asuma-sensei said, kneeling on one knee and resting his hand flat on the ground as the rustling came closer to him. “I recognize the chakra signature. Stand down.”
There was the unmistakable hiss of live steel being drawn from a scabbard. The tall ANBU-Kamiya-san, he could tell by her hair-stepped up beside him, one hand carrying the katana. “Better safe than sorry,” she murmured in a voice that barely reached his ears. Shikamaru could only agree with that. This whole mission was one long exercise in learning to be more careful. Control your temper, control your actions, remember that everything had an equal and opposite reaction.
That things had consequences. It was something he’d learnt before-he wouldn’t forget what had happened on That Mission-but apparently... it hadn’t stuck. He watched silently as an animal skittered up Asuma-sensei’s arm. Dai, then.
A mouse? He thought so, but it’d take better light or getting closer to see for sure. Instead of giving in to his nerves, Shikamaru remained where he was, keeping an eye out, and simply did his job.
Some things were too important to mess up. He refused to be the one that, if anything happened-and it had better not--that was the cause of the problem.
Walking on thin ice, and he knew it. Asuma-sensei wouldn’t hesitate, and while part of him rebelled-it wasn’t like he was trying to act out-part of him understood that. Being a leader, being someone useful, was more than rank. He just had to remember that.
Should’ve been easier to remember, something like that, than it had been. He watched, silently, as Asuma-sensei murmured in a voice too soft to be heard to the mouse while the mouse settled itself on his shoulders and talked back.
The squeak of his voice was audible, but no words carried. For the best, even if the lack of information bugged him. Planning needed information. But he would wait.
Patience, his father had told him, way back when he’d been just starting at the Academy and still learning the rules of Go and Shogi, was the key to survival. Knowing when to speak up, and knowing when to just wait it out-that’d keep you alive so long as it was used in tandem with knowing when to move. When the time for patience was over.
Balance. He needed to find his balance.
It was easier, for some reason, now that they were standing out here and waiting for the go-ahead to move out. To get Ino.
Asuma-sensei looked up, his eyes dark thanks to the poor lighting. “Alright,” he said, slow drawl replaced with something a lot more... professional. For the first time, Shikamaru could see where people might be scared of him. He was imposing. “This is what we’ve got to do, and how we’re going to do it...”
--
It was a good plan, she thought approvingly, her fingers flying through the seals that would hook the exploding tags she’d plastered to this side of the foundation to the remote detonator in her hand. A quick spiral of chakra, up through her hands before knotting tightly around the two, connecting them firmly, barely a whisper on the senses, and it was set.
Yuugao moved on. Every ten feet, he’d said, the walls thick enough, on this side, to support such an amount of tags-they didn’t have the heavy-duty ones, the ones that could blow up a bridge with only two tags-but these would be more than enough to get everyone’s attention.
Step one of the plan. Not their usual method of doing things-too much chance of the enemy using the commotion to flee-but then, this wasn’t their usual sort of mission.
(As ANBU, though, not much could be considered usual.)
Finishing her side of the building, a handful of detonators in her hand and held carefully to avoid making any unnecessary noise, she skulked her way, silent and deadly, back to the meeting point. The rest of her team joined her shortly.
“Sarutobi’s already inside, with the brats,” she said, watching them nod as her watch ticked down the time. “He said he’d be at the door right about... now. We’re to begin setting them off-cascade your explosions, don’t do it all at once, in five, four, three, two-one.” She snapped a detonator in half.
On the opposite side of the manor and explosion blasted through the air. Three more explosions followed it. Yuugao was smiling under her mask.
-0-
She was jerked from an uneasy sleep by the sudden thump of an explosion. Blearily blinking her eyes, Ino tried to get a sense of what was going on, even while Megumi-san pushed her back down.
“Stay down,” she murmured, “it’s okay, Junko-chan. Just fireworks.”
That was a lie, and a bad one that that, but Ino settled down, not moving but straining her ears to catch more of what was going on. More explosions, the crump of them going off shaking the foundations and she watched worriedly as the ceiling shook.
“Those aren’t fireworks, Onee-sama,” she insisted, making her voice scared and small. Megumi-san’s hand on her arm traced a quick ‘good’ out in signs. “What’s going on? I’m scared!”
Ino wasn’t, at least not so much, though it was unnerving to be stuck underground and hope that whomever was using explosives was keeping in mind the fact that there were people under here who really would rather not be crushed.
She huddled closer to Megumi-san, drawing their blanket tight around her shoulders and making a whimper that made 'Junko-chan' sound even more scared, but was really her reacting to the stiffness in her shoulders and back. “I’m scared, Onee-sama.”
“It’ll be okay,” came the soothing answer, coupled with a hand that brushed her hair down as comfortingly as possible-at least in appearance. “It’ll be fine. The walls will hold.”
“Someone’s fighting up there, aren’t they?” she quavered, hating the fact that her character was so... so pathetic. Obviously they were fighting up there.
Megumi-san hesitated, and Ino held her breath knowing it wasn’t from her answer. She wanted to see if she could find anything, feel anything, but knew that keeping her chakra clamped down and out of notice was one of the things that had saved her skin so far. Ino didn’t want to know more than she wanted to live. She could wait for an answer.
“I think so,” she admitted reluctantly, face pale even in the dark, while her fingers tapped out the number seven on Ino’s arm. “We’ll be safe here.”
Lies within lies. If there’d been only three, then she would’ve thought it was her team-daring a rescue, but seven? Ino clung to Megumi-san’s hand, and rested her head against it. “I hope it’s over soon.”
That, at least, was the truth. The explosives going off over their heads was unnerving, and Ino had no desire to be buried in rubble. Not on her first B rank mission. Talk about embarrassing. And deathly.
“Onee-sa-”
Megumi-san raised her hand sharply. Ino shut up, and just stared the same direction as she was, trying to strain her ears to hear anything. More tags going off, the distant shouts of people.
“Ino-kun.” Megumi-san’s voice was cool, controlled, and resolute. “Our watchers have left the area.”
She blinked. Her real name? “Onee-sama?” Ino didn’t dare break her cover; not when she couldn’t tell even how many watchers they’d had.
“We’re getting out,” Megumi-san said, forcing herself off the bed. “Quickly.”
Ino’s chin rose. “Your injuries first,” she insisted.
Megumi-san paused, glancing at her, eyes assessing for a moment before nodding once. “As quickly as you can. Don’t drain yourself--we might have to fight.”
-0-
Sweat was beginning to sneak its way down the back of his shirt. Chouji paid it little mind though-his attention firmly on moving when Asuma-sensei said to, stopping when he gestured, and using Henge no Jutsu at a moment’s notice.
Using it so often made it harder to remember-fingers wanting to grow clumsy, tired of following the same patterns-but he focused, and did it. Kamiya-san hadn’t wanted them to do this part but Asuma-sensei had said it would be good practice.
It was more tiring than he’d thought it would be. Shikamaru just behind him, Chouji knew without looking that his eyes would be intent and deadly serious. No time for chips now, or cigarettes, or being lazy. Just the job.
The place, with the wooden flooring, and sliding doors was silent-most of the household asleep, and he was glad for that. It was one less that they had to worry about in-between jutsu, footsteps, and using chakra while keeping it suppressed. Multi-tasking.
“Here,” Asuma-sensei murmured, voice low enough that it was a strain to hear the words. Chouji stopped, glancing at the door, and keeping up the Henge that said they were just part of the wall, don’t notice them, nothing around but wall.
Down there was Ino. They were going down there. The distant crump of an explosion was all the signal they needed for Asuma-sensei to open the door.
In they went.
--
It was a risk. But everything was a risk. Yuugao’s explosions started going off, they’d continue at set intervals as the ANBU agents darted their way through the building to join them. Simple plans.
Asuma didn’t like it, but he was used to being on missions where he didn’t like things. You got over whining really fast when you learnt out in the middle of a war, when your Jounin sensei was less sensei and more commander. That was when you learned that whining didn’t matter.
Didn’t mean he had to like the fact that his students-his almost painfully green students-were with him when there were at least three enemy Jounin and who knew how many Chuunin just down the stairs. His sensei had never advocated keeping people out of the front lines though, so he’d brought them.
And would have to hope they were up to it. Teamwork would get them through it, that much he had confidence in. Few teams, even those with shinobi twice their age, had teamwork that came so smoothly together.
He went down first, that much at least he could do, and his kunai caught an Iwa-nin (lord, he hated Iwa-nin) in the eye. “Find them,” he snapped, blocking a strike from another, “and get them out of here.”
--
Easier by far to burst in and race through the building, the sprawling gardens, the well-kept halls, than to have snuck in, like a thief-like a ninja--and far less use of resources. The screaming, though, she could have done without.
Not that it kept her from detonating another blast as she darted around another corner. Her hair flying out behind her. The ceiling was the best place to run, no traffic, and in a panic, few people looked up before it was too late to really tell just what it was that had gone past them.
A few seconds was all they needed to get by. So far, few had been injured in the blasts-they’d planned that too. Civilians, well, no need to kill more of them than they had to. Bad for business. Another corner and Kouhei set of their next round. The blasts echoed through the building, loud but fading into background noise as they ran, following instructions that they’d been given by a mouse.
The door was right where they’d been told it would be. Corpses lay out on the stairs as they ran down the ceiling, dealing with the tilt in gravity with a simple bit of chakra smoothing the motion. Yuugao cracked another detonator in her hand, and flung herself off the ceiling, landing on the floor with her katana already out, and joining in the fray.
Blood flew.
--
All out battle, Chouji was quickly coming to realize, as he did a quick Kawarimi and got out of the way of an Iwa-nin with a rank higher than his, was different than one-on-one. Somehow that fact hadn’t occurred to him before.
Or the fact that his family’s jutsu were close to useless in the middle of a building-even worse, while they were in the basement. The only thing it would do would be to make him an easier target. Chouji dodged, using chakra to up his strength and smashed a punch into the stomach of a ninja too slow to get away from him.
He dropped like a stone. Chouji slit his throat. He didn’t like it, but Asuma-sensei had been quite firm-they were to leave no enemy alive behind them. People only got their allies killed that way.
“Pay attention,” Shikamaru snapped, as his friend caught a ninja Chouji hadn’t noticed was ready to attack. Chouji grinned tightly, his kunai held tight, as he dispatched that ninja as well, letting Shikamaru reclaim his shadow just in time to use it to smash a ninja into the wall. Ow.
Blood was warm on his hands, but so far none of it was his. Teamwork. Right. They could do this. He just wished they hadn’t had to.
-0-
Green chakra, pale like the first grass of spring, spilled from her hands, throwing her face into sharp relief and gave her light enough to see the injuries that Megumi-san had sustained. Sweat dripped down her face, down the middle of her back, as she worked. Ino didn’t care-her world had narrowed down to the chakra she was using, the injuries, and keeping her concentration steady.
Distantly, she was aware that there were sounds of battle, but Ino forced it out of her mind. It didn’t matter right this second, so she had to ignore it. She wasn’t good enough to pay attention to anything else but the injuries right in front of her.
Her head was dizzy by the time she stopped pouring chakra, exactly the way that Shizune-sensei had shown her, into Megumi-san’s injuries, watching as many of the smaller wounds disappeared entirely, and the deeper cuts closed, looking much better, but not entirely gone. The bruises were left mostly untouched, having decided that the cuts were more urgent to get rid of.
Ino let the flickering green glow around her hands fade, retaining just enough sense to run them over her knees, getting rid of some of the ache, before sinking back, lowering her head, and just breathing. Almost drained, she wasn’t going to be able to do much more for Megumi-san in terms of healing.
A hand came to rest on her head. Ino leaned against it for a moment, before forcing herself up and away, getting labouriously to her feet, and biting back the whimper of pain her back let off. It did not appreciate the abuse she’d been putting it through.
“How long have you been studying medical jutsu?” Megumi-san asked and Ino couldn’t figure out what the tone she was using meant.
She struggled to get her thoughts in order. “A few months?” Ino said, leaning against the far wall and forcing herself to stretch out sore muscles. Chakra mostly gone or not, she was at least in better physical shape at the moment than Megumi-san.
Of course, Megumi-san was a Jounin, so that might be wrong. Ino didn’t spare that thought another moment. Didn’t have the time, needed to get as many of the kinks worked out as she could. Which wasn’t many in all honesty. She needed sleep, a hot bath, and more chakra. Her head ached.
“Months,” Megumi-san said getting up, a bit stiff and slowly, but looking as far as Ino could tell in the dim room-true dark was the tunnels they were facing next-as if she were moving easier. “You’re a fast learner.”
Ino flushed slightly. “Just simple cuts is about my level right about now,” she said not sure what else there was to say to that. A slow learner just got people killed. She didn’t want people dead. At least, not those on her side. “Sorry I can’t do more.”
“I’m glad for this much,” Megumi-san said firmly. “Don’t worry about it.”
That made her feel a bit better, and she forced the matter out of her mind-they had more important things to worry about. “We need to get out of here,” Ino said, watching Megumi-san check her body over. “Do we want to wait and see if it’s a rescue, or just other people who’re going after them too.”
Megumi-san turned over that, looking like she was about to answer before stiffening, glancing at the door that kept them safe, and biting out an order.
“Get down!” she snapped as the door burst open, spilling light into the room, and completely ruining what vision they’d managed to get in the dark.
Ino flung herself to the ground, rolling to tuck herself into the smallest target possible. Her eyes watered as she tried to get a good view, but Megumi-san was moving so fast Ino could barely track her as the man came in, spotted her, and had just turned to look for Megumi-san-
When he fell to the ground, his neck snapped, and Megumi-san looking grimly pleased. “We’ll have weapons at least,” she said, kneeling next to the corpse and searching through his pouches.
Ino swallowed. “I could barely see you move,” she said, getting to her feet. “And you’re so injured still.”
“Training lets you ignore pain,” Megumi-san said, pulling out kunai, some wickedly curved shuriken, and even better, some bandages and the small pills that Ino knew were either chakra pills, or pain pills. “I’m normally faster.”
They got ready, Megumi-taking more of the weapons than Ino did, and downing a few of the pain pills. While she did that, Ino knelt by the tunnel, prying the opening wide with her fingertips.
“Take these,” Megumi-san said, forcing two little round pills into her hand. “Dry swallow, we don’t have water. That’s our tunnel, is it?”
Behind them, the door was still open. Ino did what she was told, there was no time for arguing. “Oh,” she said, sounding revolted after swallowing against the bitter metallic taste, “let’s not do that again. Yeah, we’re going down. Do you think you can get the opening shut when you go down?”
Extra bit of precaution. Anything helped.
“I’ll deal with the panel,” Megumi-san said, shooing her on. “Go, the long we’re here, the longer we’re in danger.” And they weren’t up for a real fight.
Ino dropped into the tunnel, wincing as she jarred her knees, and moved forward a few feet before twisting her head to peer back as Megumi-san sealed them into the dark. She was starting to really hate the dark. Taking a deep breath, Ino made herself stop thinking about anything but the route they’d have to take. It was her memory, after all, that was needed now.
They moved out.
Behind her, the sounds of battle, friend-or-foe, she didn’t know, were fading as they put distance between them and the room they’d been held. Megumi-san was breathing in short pants, and Ino glanced over her shoulder, frowning. Her hands ached, her knees ached, it’d get a lot worse before it got better, and they had to keep going. There was no time to stop.
They couldn’t risk someone following after them. They had to move. But she didn’t like that Megumi-san was already so injured, speed was of the essence, and so she paused.
“Do you want me to see if I can patch you up a bit more?” she asked, a bit diffidently.
“No,” Megumi-san said with a shake of her head that Ino felt more than saw. “Save your chakra, I’ll make it as I am.”
She nodded, torn between wanting to help more, and being glad that she didn’t have to try in the pitch dark of the tunnels. “Yes, Onee-sama.”
“Good,” Megumi-san said, and they kept moving, crawling through the tunnel, and let the darkness swallow them.
-0-
Blood dripped from his knuckles, his breathing was slightly fast, but nothing to worry about, and Asuma was feeling a good bit better than he had been for the last few days.
Nothing like violence as stress relief. Dodging a Katon jutsu-what the hell kind of idiot played with fire inside a building?-Asuma took care of that by kneeing the other shinobi in the gut and then breaking his nose and shoving the bone shards into the man’s brain.
It was a painful death.
Shikamaru was dealing with one on a set of stairs, his shadow locking the higher ranked man in place while Chouji broke the shinobi’s neck. Efficient. Not as fast as they could be, but he was glad to see that their teamwork was back to its usual high standard. He didn’t have the time to worry about them, not in the middle of battle.
“Watch out,” Yuugao told him, her mask firmly in place, as she skewered a kunoichi who’d been behind him. “Your kids are fine. It’d be embarrassing if you weren’t.”
He barked a laugh at that. “I’ve been taking care of myself longer than you have.” That was all the time he had to speak before his world narrowed down to enemies, allies, and getting rid of people who were doing their best to kill him while he did his best to kill them back.
Bloody game, and no one was keeping score. He got separated from the rest, letting Dai squeak little directions in his ears in-between braining another shinobi, and the ever important need to dodge-no sign of Yakushi, he noted, probably fled the area-and as he followed the instructions of a mouse (some days, it just wasn’t worth trying to make things sound less weird) there was less fighting for him to do.
Good. It meant that between the ANBU and his team they’d been dragging most of the shinobi down here out of position and away from the girls. Down another flight of stairs-how many floors did this basement have? He’d counted three levels so far-and he paused upon finding an open door half way down the hall.
A sandaled foot was sticking out the open door-the door that Dai had sworn had the girls in it, and Asuma picked up his pace, swearing-they hadn’t been armed, if there’d been more of them, then-
The man, an Iwa-nin from his hitae-ite, was the only one in the room. He gripped the door frame with one hand, surveying the place. The corpse had been very neatly and thoroughly scavenged from.
A grin touched his lips. It meant that they were still thinking. And that at least one of them was able and willing to use weapons still. Asuma knelt, noticing the absence of painkillers-at least one of them was injured then-and soldier pills.
Armed and dangerous. Sounded good to him. Asuma glanced back at the door, down the hall, and listened to the sounds of fighting. He didn’t want to get trapped in this room. Staying here then wasn’t an option.
He wasn’t bad at tracking, but he wasn’t the best at it either, better at brute force solutions and thinking himself out of a tight spot. Lucky for him (and Ino and Kotone) he had someone with him who was good at tracking.
“Dai,” he murmured to the mouse who’d taken refuge in his shirt when the fighting had started. “Can you find which way the girls went?”
There was a good bit of squirming as the little mouse wriggled out of his shirt, landing on the floor with a little plop and shaking his head as he scurried through the room, scenting the air. “They’re both hurt,” Dai reported after a moment. “There’s two types of blood in the air, and I recognize Kotone’s.”
Asuma wasn’t smiling now. Killing intent rode the air like the calm before the storm. He’d hoped that Ino would be left alone, that her youth would protect her long enough for them to get her out without having to deal with any of the darker side of being captured. She was so green.
“Go on,” he said, wrestling his temper under control. It would help no one if he lost his temper.
It was several minutes, time that Asuma spent further inspecting the corpse-recent, not yet having hit rigor mortis, and the neck had been broken cleanly, it had to be Megumi’s handiwork-before Dai spoke up near the far wall.
“They went out through here,” the mouse squeaked. Asuma glanced at the wall; it looked like any other, but underneath the underneath was a basic tenant for a reason. He found the panel in a few minutes, helped out by Dai’s nose.
He tried moving it. It stayed shut.
Asuma frowned at the wall thoughtfully, probing with his chakra at it and finding a twinge that felt a lot like Konoha-based work. “Megumi’s got this door trapped nine ways to hell, doesn’t she?” It made him feel a bit better to know she was still capable of doing work like that. Always a good sign.
Peace had made him slow too. Of course she would. “We need to catch them where the tunnel opens up,” he said, lifting the mouse up and setting him on his shoulder. “Can you, once we get outside, follow their trail.”
Dai considered that thoughtfully. “Chakra-signatures,” he said slowly, “Kotone-sama’s is muted but present, I should be able to follow it.”
“Good, ca--” he started, cutting off the rest of his sentence when Shikamaru and Chouji arrived at the door. They were bloodied, but a quick glance told him that their injuries were nothing serious.
“Where is she?” Shikamaru asked, taking in the room with a glance. Chouji’s face was no less anxious.
“They pulled their own escape stunt,” Asuma said, feeling relief flood through him. “We’re getting out of here, leave the clean up to the nice ANBU, and go see if we can catch them before they collapse.” He hated to dim their smiles, but couldn’t keep this information from them. “Both of them are hurt, so be careful when we find them-depending on how bad it is, they might not recognize you as an ally at first.”
Both of them nodded. Asuma shoved them out the door as Dai scrambled into his shirt again. He was almost getting used to that sensation.
“Clever girls.”
--
Previous Chapter // Chapter List // Next Chapter
Chapter: 10 Misjudged (Part III)
Author/Artist: Skylar Inari
Pairing: Yamanaka Ino/Nara Shikamaru
Theme: 05 - Your precious someone
Word Count: 8268
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. AU immediately after the Sasuke Retrieval Arc. Part 10 of ? Unbeta'd.
---
I found a way out.
The words echoed around in her head, taking Megumi a few moments to put them together, and when she did, her hands tightened on the hard bed, digging against the stone only to find it didn’t really affect it.
Ino-kun’s hand on her cheek felt rough and a bit ragged. She focused on that, as she tried to think of a way to say something that would get her more information without alerting their watchers. Even as hurt as she was, she knew they had to be present.
“I’m awake,” she said soothingly, even though it hurt. “Is there any water, Junko-chan?”
“There’s a bit,” Ino-kun said, almost apologetically as she slid away to get the water. “I was thirsty, so there’s not as much as there was. But there should be enough. I’m so glad you’re back.”
Megumi nodded, closing her eyes and thinking as furiously as the pain in her body would allow her. There was a way out, Ino-kun had found it, but going from the condition of her hands, Megumi could guess that it wasn’t the easiest way out. (There was never an easy way out.) The knowledge, though, that they could get out was one she was glad to know.
(It made hope easier to grasp.)
She slowly pushed herself into a seated position, careful of her injuries, and even so feeling a few of them open to bleed sluggishly. They stung, but she had felt worse, had worse, and there was a way out.
Ino-kun too, she knew, would be able to help. Even just in training, as she’d read in Ino-kun’s file, the girl wasn’t bad at medic training. Not, it had read, spectacularly skilled-that was the Hokage’s apprentice, everyone agreed-but talented enough that, had she the inclination, she’d have made a decent medic nin. It hadn’t taken Megumi long, upon meeting the girl, to see why she hadn’t gone for it, and why Hokage-sama hadn’t pushed for it.
At fourteen, it was already obvious that the girl was ill-suited to a life spent healing.
A hiss of pain escaped her, and while she could’ve held it in, there was no point when they were, for all intents and purposes supposed to be civilians.
“I’ve got the water, Onee-sama,” Ino-kun said, hovering now and looking like she wasn’t sure if she was supposed to hand over the cup, or not, and to all appearances was close to wringing her hands in dismay.
Megumi solved that problem by reaching for it. Carefully, and letting her breath out slowly. “I’ll be okay,” she said soothingly, “it’ll be okay, Junko-chan.” It wasn’t, but it was the sort of thing an older sister would say. And she wasn’t dead yet, though Megumi wouldn’t want to try fighting in her current condition.
Ino-kun bobbed her head, damping a bit of cloth and using it to press against one of the wounds that were bleeding. There was a very real bit of frustration in her eyes. “I wish I could do more for you.”
Because she could do more, and both of them knew it. If not for the guards, the silent watchers, who were keeping an eye on everything they said and did...
“You’re doing enough just by being here,” she said, shifting so the injury was easier for her to access. Ino-kun’s eyes dropped as she sighed. Megumi sipped at the water, grateful for it even if it wasn’t the best quality. Water was precious. “I don’t want you to wind up like this.”
And worse yet, if she were caught using chakra.
Ino-kun’s voice was quiet. “I know, Onee-sama.”
There was silence then, but for the pained noises she let past her lips and the soft slosh of water and the rag, she didn’t know where Ino-kun had gotten it, but that didn’t matter. Once they got away from here, it would be simple enough to get rid of many of the cuts.
At Ino-kun’s age, and remembering what had been noted about her chakra levels in the file, Megumi doubted that she had the strength to take care of all of the injuries, not in one go, but there were ways to dull the pain, even still.
Eventually the wounds were cleaned as well as they could be considering the circumstances, and they settled on the pallet together, for all the world looking like they were just two sisters huddled miserably together with a blanket around their shoulders.
In a way, that was correct. They just weren’t sisters. Under the cover of the blanket, and hoping the relative darkness would cover everything else, Megumi took the time to inspect Ino-kun’s hands. Ripped up, and tender, she felt, but didn’t hear, the flinch Ino-kun gave at that.
Sore then; she could sympathize. The way the skin was rent through gave her an idea for how Ino-kun had been moving. With a bit of a sigh, she carefully inspected Ino-kun’s knees. It earned her a bigger flinch, but still no sound.
Megumi left off her inspection, there was no point in bringing more pain around when they had quite enough to share already. “It’ll be alright, Junko-chan,” she said soothingly. Her fingers found Ino-kun’s bare arm and traced out, in shinobi sign language, very simply: Where?
It had to be in this room.
Ino-kun sighed, looking like she was relaxing slightly, even as her eyes fell shut to further cover the gleam in them. “It’d be better if there was a window,” Ino lamented. “So we could at least see the light. It’s scary, Onee-sama, the dark.”
Her lips curved slightly. There was her answer-not precise, of course, but a good enough of one. It was in the wall opposite of the door. “Close your eyes, and sleep, little dreamer,” she said, reaching carefully to brush one hand in Ino-kun’s hair, pausing for a moment at feeling the bits of dirt in it, before continuing on. “And if we’re lucky, we’ll be let out soon. We haven’t done anything wrong.”
Ino-kun nodded, falling silent, and Megumi stared into the dark, not looking at the wall, but not avoiding it either, as the Genin by her side fell asleep.
They had a way out. Now they only needed a distraction.
-0-
To anyone watching, he just looked like a man with a cigarette who was sitting languidly on top of the children’s slide in the neatly kept park. He was, in fact, exactly that-so anyone watching wouldn’t be entirely wrong.
They wouldn’t be entirely right either, though.
Asuma took a drag on his cigarette, letting the smoke puff up in neat little circles and returned to his studying of the area. If it hadn’t been that this was the easiest way to look at ease, he’d not have had one. The cravings made it easier to concentrate, but as it was he would have one, but only one, and make it last as long as he could. This was where Shikamaru and Chouji had disobeyed him, this was the starting point from where they’d gone on to find Yuuta and Kobayashi and brought them back.
Which meant, potentially, that it was an entry point back into the complex. Of course he couldn’t look like he was checking out the area, so the cigarette.
A rustling in the grass caught his attention, and held it as the rustling didn’t stop as it got closer to him. Outwardly he still looked completely at ease, but his mind raced, and he casually placed his hand on his thigh-where, not so coincidently he had shuriken available.
There was a squeak, and then another. He listened, almost bemused now, as the mouse-it had to be mouse-squeaked out Kotone’s passcode. With a sigh that was entirely false, Asuma stubbed out the cigarette, tucking the butt into one of his pouches-no need to waste good nicotine-and climbed down the slide. He’d have leapt down, but it was hard, in the growing dark to tell exactly where the creature was.
Once on the ground, it was an easy thing to pretend he’d dropped something and, kneeling to pick it up, was unsurprised when a mouse quickly darted up his arm, coming to rest up on his shoulder.
“Report,” he murmured, straightening up carefully, not wanting to knock the little guy off his shoulder. “Name and allegiance.”
The brush of whiskers against his neck was his first answer. “Dai,” the mouse squeaked, sounding as amused as a mouse could. “Kotone-sama.”
Asuma nodded, shushing the mouse and walking slowly, and easily, towards the wooded area. It was a risk, yes, but he had to get out of clear sight, where anyone walking by would be able to notice that he had something sitting on his shoulder. Aomori-shi had been awash rumours of siblings plotting against the Daimyo, and the last thing he needed--they needed-was rumours of that sort getting fuel like this. He didn’t need to be linked, even in silhouette, to a conspiracy like that.
Not, he thought wryly, as he entered the first bit of greenery, when he was, in fact, mixed up in it already. There was no need to be sloppy though. Not when he’d so recently been on his other students’ for that one.
“Report,” he said, once he had his back to a tree, it didn’t matter that it was damp, just that he wasn’t fully exposed.
Dai did. Asuma found that the longer he listened to the little mouse, the easier it was to ignore the squeaky-undertone and the odd way some of the words were emphasized. It was about what he had suspected--their capture, the way that the mouse had been sent to find help.
And a great deal of added grumbling that if she'd wanted help quicker, Kotone-sama ought to have sent a bigger mouse, or one that had his scent--not, Dai conceded, would it have done much good considering that it had been raining off and on and scents were all but impossible to track.
That got a chuckle, though it wasn't funny. “She did the best she could,” he said quietly.
A cold nose pressed against his neck. “I know,” Dai said, muttering half-heartedly, “best can still be improved on though.”
“You're here now,” Asuma replied, “and so we'll work it out--we'll get them out of there.” He had to believe that, less for Kotone--who was quite able to take care of herself, and had the training to do so--and more for Ino. This was no laughing matter to him.
He didn't want to have to tell her parents that she'd gotten killed on a mission that she shouldn't even have been on in the first place. He shook his head, very slightly, filling his lungs with the damp but familiar scent of sodden leaves and ground so soaked through that it moved under his feet no matter how careful he was in stepping through the loam and accumulated debris of a wooded area.
“Have you been able to pinpoint where they are?” he asked, fingers itching for a cigarette and making himself ignore that urge. Dai had been, when the little mouse hadn't been able to find him, searching through the manor for any sign of where they'd taken the girls.
An affirmative squeak answered that question.
Turning it over in his head, it didn't take long to come to a conclusion--his boys could wait for him a little longer, this was a lead they needed. “Take me,” he said, a dark smile crossing his face.
It was good to be doing something. They went. Asuma on silent feet, picking his way through the undergrowth, and into the grounds. Dai muttering instructions against his neck. Their progress got slower as he slipped into the building, knowing that already he was over-due to return to the hotel, that they'd be concerned, but that now he was here and there was no turning back.
People were still awake--late enough that they were starting to head to their sleeping quarters, but not so late that most of the household was asleep. Careful henges--he was a pot of plants, an ornate curtain complete with bow, a half open door--one of the basic jutsu but used to its fullest capabilities. There was a good reason why it was taught in the Academy--get the kids used to thinking that they could change shape, look like something else, and it used so little chakra that even an Academy student could hold it for a good while.
He could go for days like this, and had, way back in the war. It felt not good, not exactly, but like slipping on an old glove--comfortable. Asuma prided himself on being a good Jounin sensei, but he had never particularly wanted to be one. This, though, he liked.
An hour and a half it took him, henging his way through the complex, avoiding people, avoiding sight, and using as little chakra as humanly possible to sneak through unnoticed--too much chakra and the enemy shinobi would notice for sure. Too little, and the henge wouldn't be solid enough. He didn't need a see-through illusion.
“Down there,” Dai said, nose practically in his ear, and sounding a great deal more respectful than he had before this.
Asuma studied the door, the steps, that lead down into what looked like a cellar in an out of the way part of the grounds. Risking it, right now, with just him was out of the question. Even as the fact that he had to turn back grated on his nerves. His student was past that door.
So were enemy shinobi, and he had no idea how many of them there were.
“Good,” he said, setting the mouse down on the ground. “Get the layout of it, see how many people there are. Wait for me in the park when you're done.”
The mouse nodded, skittering through the tiny space between the floor and door, and was gone.
Asuma, not wanting to linger, began the slow process of getting out of the building. They had a rescue to plan, and now they knew where the girls were.
Time to get moving.
-0-
Asuma-sensei was late.
Nearly three hours now, from when Yuuta-san had said he'd was supposed to check in, and Shikamaru had to focus, again, on the plans he and Chouji were trying to put together--even if they turned out to be useless, it was something to do other than stare at the team of ANBU that had arrived an hour ago.
Their leader, a tall long-haired woman, was talking in a murmur to Yuuta, the other three members of the squad having gone off to get another room--there was no way their poor hotel room could hold nine people--ten, he corrected, when Asuma-sensei got back.
And twelve when they got Ino and Megumi-san out of trouble. Too many people, too many thoughts, what was he thinking again?
Shikamaru gazed around the room-Chouji half asleep by now, getting what rest he could while sitting on the rough carpet of the room, his back against the wall. The two wounded ANBU-Shimako and Kobayashi hadn’t stirred yet, and no wonder, they needed sleep. Yuuta and Kamiya-san, he thought that was her name, paying him no attention.
Fine. Good, even. It gave him more room to concentrate. Except that he couldn’t. It gnawed on his nerves-first Ino and Megumi-san, and now Asuma-sensei hadn’t checked back in.
He was going to focus. Despite all of that, there were still things he could do, and Shikamaru glanced through the notes he’d taken about their current equipment and what they knew for sure that their sensei had. His shadow shifted, spooling out and making the shadows under his legs, where his knees crossed, under his arms, darker. Thicker.
Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, wishing once again that his shadow was better under his control. This mission, of all things, was wrecking havoc on the uneasy state of shadow. His father had warned him of the possibility, Shikamaru had discounted it, figuring that the mission wouldn’t go horribly wrong, and now wished that he had paid more attention to what had been said.
There were times when laziness was the worst route. He’d figured out that his emotions played greatly into it, but meditating wasn’t his strong point-concentrating on a problem, sure, that was no issue, but actually meditating, he had more difficulty with. They didn’t have the time for him to find a good place to lay out and watch the sky until he felt more stable.
He wasn’t going to get more stable, so he was just going to have to deal and keep on moving. Thinking. Acting and reacting. Shikamaru had no interest in being sent home, in disgrace, though that was a mild thing compared to the fact that Ino wasn’t around to scold him.
A smile made his lips twitch as he thought about what she’d say if she saw him doing so little. It’d be loud, and cutting, and probably right-not that he’d admit to it, not out-loud and not to her.
He missed her.
He shook his head, trying to clear it-what sort of maudlin thoughts were those?-as, at the door, a careful sequence of raps was tapped out, one by one, in a very recognizable pattern.
Asuma-sensei.
Scrambling to his feet, shaking sleep from his eyes, sleep he’d been ignoring in favour of fretting, he watched as Yuuta went on silent feet to get the door. That it was knocking and nothing else was a good sign, but he knew the other man had been concerned as time had stretched further and further past the point when he had been supposed to come back.
It was him, however, and while he looked grim, there was the scent of cigarette smoke clinging in the air. He was silent as the door was shut behind him, looking askance at Kamiya. Chouji wide-awake and looking, if you knew him well, disgruntled about the sudden return to full alertness.
“ANBU reinforcements showed up while you were out,” Shikamaru said, filling the silence. “Kamiya-san and her team. They’ve secured the room next to ours.”
Asuma-sensei glanced for confirmation at Yuuta and Shikamaru tried not to let that grate on his nerves. He'd admitted that he'd been acting childish and worse during a mission where lives were on the line, so he couldn't really blame him. His shadow shifted under him, and Shikamaru spent a moment with his attention less on his sensei and more on calming the stupid thing down.
He needed to spend more time with his dad, just to get this under control. The last thing he needed was to run more missions with his shadow reacting to every bump and curve of his temper. Made it hard to lie, even if the lying was even just to himself.
“Good,” Asuma-sensei said eventually, bowing his head to Kamiya-san. “If you could call your team together, I've got a lead with more information forthcoming.”
Chouji perked up at that, as did Shikamaru, and it was amazing how fast the rest of the ANBU assembled in the room, perched on every available surface, and looking both lethal-they had their masks down, Shikamaru suspected it was under orders to kept their identities from getting out, he doubted that Kamiya was her real name-and utterly silent. Creepy.
“In two hours,” Asuma-sensei said, looking mildly amused and Shikamaru didn’t know why, “we’ll be meeting the source in the park on the western side of the target’s location. Our source may be a bit late, the distances are a bit much at his size, but he’s absolutely Konoha-loyal, and furthermore, loyal to Amaya-san.”
Yuuta was smirking now. “Dai got a hold of you?”
Dai? Shikamaru put that thought on hold while Asuma-sensei nodded. “That’s what took so long-he took me in to do preliminary scouting, and as we speak is trying to get in further to see if he can better pin-point their location. He’ll have an update in a few hours.”
“Should we continue to patrol?” Chouji asked, breaking the silence.
“No,” he said, “you’ll be coming with us.” He didn’t look happy about it either.
“Is that wise?” Kamiya-san interjected. “They’re green, and this is a retrieval mission.”
Shikamaru held his breath, Chouji beside him doing the same. He didn’t know why Asuma-sensei was letting them in on the mission-he, at least, had certainly not been behaving anything like he was supposed to be, and this should’ve been... a prime time to leave him out of things. He wanted to go though.
“Because,” Asuma-sensei said, a frown crossing his face. “They’ll never stop being green without experience. And... if they’re hurt, the boys are the ones that know her the best. She’ll be less likely to freak out if she’s past the point of being able to fully recognize help.”
Shikamaru’s heart settled in his chest, tight and cold.
Kamiya-san’s ANBU mask gave nothing of her feelings away. But she nodded. “It’ll be up to you to keep yourselves alive,” she said crisply, glancing at him and Chouji. “We’ll help if we can, but from the sounds of it, we’ll be dealing with a lot of things at once. If you can’t keep up, stay here.”
They nodded. Shikamaru knew that what he was thinking, and what Chouji was thinking was the same--they'd keep up, come hell or high water.
-0-
Cool air prickled along his arms, raising goosebumps on the bare skin. The wind carried the weight of rain, blowing the leaves on the trees upside down so that their pale undersides were shown. Shikamaru made sure his hair was tied back securely-one thing that both him and Ino shared before a mission, the need to tie back their hair-and flexed his hands. The playground they were in looked less amusing, and more ominous in the dark.
Around him, his shadow blotted out the ground. Asuma-sensei gave it a long glance, but said nothing, his face set and determined. Chouji to his right, looking almost serene, and the ANBU-Kamiya-san’s team, Yuuta and the others remaining at the hotel-faded into the background but for their masks. Pale smudges in the darkness, ominous in their expressionless features.
Shikamaru looked away from them, and shifted uneasily. They creeped him out, and that was the whole point of ANBU. To be nightmarish-taking the hardest, dirtiest missions, and doing them no matter what the mission was about. He couldn’t imagine doing that.
He had enough trouble with his nightmares already. Something else to talk to his dad about when they got back with Ino.
A rustling noise in the grass had them all snapping to attention.
“It’s Dai,” Asuma-sensei said, kneeling on one knee and resting his hand flat on the ground as the rustling came closer to him. “I recognize the chakra signature. Stand down.”
There was the unmistakable hiss of live steel being drawn from a scabbard. The tall ANBU-Kamiya-san, he could tell by her hair-stepped up beside him, one hand carrying the katana. “Better safe than sorry,” she murmured in a voice that barely reached his ears. Shikamaru could only agree with that. This whole mission was one long exercise in learning to be more careful. Control your temper, control your actions, remember that everything had an equal and opposite reaction.
That things had consequences. It was something he’d learnt before-he wouldn’t forget what had happened on That Mission-but apparently... it hadn’t stuck. He watched silently as an animal skittered up Asuma-sensei’s arm. Dai, then.
A mouse? He thought so, but it’d take better light or getting closer to see for sure. Instead of giving in to his nerves, Shikamaru remained where he was, keeping an eye out, and simply did his job.
Some things were too important to mess up. He refused to be the one that, if anything happened-and it had better not--that was the cause of the problem.
Walking on thin ice, and he knew it. Asuma-sensei wouldn’t hesitate, and while part of him rebelled-it wasn’t like he was trying to act out-part of him understood that. Being a leader, being someone useful, was more than rank. He just had to remember that.
Should’ve been easier to remember, something like that, than it had been. He watched, silently, as Asuma-sensei murmured in a voice too soft to be heard to the mouse while the mouse settled itself on his shoulders and talked back.
The squeak of his voice was audible, but no words carried. For the best, even if the lack of information bugged him. Planning needed information. But he would wait.
Patience, his father had told him, way back when he’d been just starting at the Academy and still learning the rules of Go and Shogi, was the key to survival. Knowing when to speak up, and knowing when to just wait it out-that’d keep you alive so long as it was used in tandem with knowing when to move. When the time for patience was over.
Balance. He needed to find his balance.
It was easier, for some reason, now that they were standing out here and waiting for the go-ahead to move out. To get Ino.
Asuma-sensei looked up, his eyes dark thanks to the poor lighting. “Alright,” he said, slow drawl replaced with something a lot more... professional. For the first time, Shikamaru could see where people might be scared of him. He was imposing. “This is what we’ve got to do, and how we’re going to do it...”
--
It was a good plan, she thought approvingly, her fingers flying through the seals that would hook the exploding tags she’d plastered to this side of the foundation to the remote detonator in her hand. A quick spiral of chakra, up through her hands before knotting tightly around the two, connecting them firmly, barely a whisper on the senses, and it was set.
Yuugao moved on. Every ten feet, he’d said, the walls thick enough, on this side, to support such an amount of tags-they didn’t have the heavy-duty ones, the ones that could blow up a bridge with only two tags-but these would be more than enough to get everyone’s attention.
Step one of the plan. Not their usual method of doing things-too much chance of the enemy using the commotion to flee-but then, this wasn’t their usual sort of mission.
(As ANBU, though, not much could be considered usual.)
Finishing her side of the building, a handful of detonators in her hand and held carefully to avoid making any unnecessary noise, she skulked her way, silent and deadly, back to the meeting point. The rest of her team joined her shortly.
“Sarutobi’s already inside, with the brats,” she said, watching them nod as her watch ticked down the time. “He said he’d be at the door right about... now. We’re to begin setting them off-cascade your explosions, don’t do it all at once, in five, four, three, two-one.” She snapped a detonator in half.
On the opposite side of the manor and explosion blasted through the air. Three more explosions followed it. Yuugao was smiling under her mask.
-0-
She was jerked from an uneasy sleep by the sudden thump of an explosion. Blearily blinking her eyes, Ino tried to get a sense of what was going on, even while Megumi-san pushed her back down.
“Stay down,” she murmured, “it’s okay, Junko-chan. Just fireworks.”
That was a lie, and a bad one that that, but Ino settled down, not moving but straining her ears to catch more of what was going on. More explosions, the crump of them going off shaking the foundations and she watched worriedly as the ceiling shook.
“Those aren’t fireworks, Onee-sama,” she insisted, making her voice scared and small. Megumi-san’s hand on her arm traced a quick ‘good’ out in signs. “What’s going on? I’m scared!”
Ino wasn’t, at least not so much, though it was unnerving to be stuck underground and hope that whomever was using explosives was keeping in mind the fact that there were people under here who really would rather not be crushed.
She huddled closer to Megumi-san, drawing their blanket tight around her shoulders and making a whimper that made 'Junko-chan' sound even more scared, but was really her reacting to the stiffness in her shoulders and back. “I’m scared, Onee-sama.”
“It’ll be okay,” came the soothing answer, coupled with a hand that brushed her hair down as comfortingly as possible-at least in appearance. “It’ll be fine. The walls will hold.”
“Someone’s fighting up there, aren’t they?” she quavered, hating the fact that her character was so... so pathetic. Obviously they were fighting up there.
Megumi-san hesitated, and Ino held her breath knowing it wasn’t from her answer. She wanted to see if she could find anything, feel anything, but knew that keeping her chakra clamped down and out of notice was one of the things that had saved her skin so far. Ino didn’t want to know more than she wanted to live. She could wait for an answer.
“I think so,” she admitted reluctantly, face pale even in the dark, while her fingers tapped out the number seven on Ino’s arm. “We’ll be safe here.”
Lies within lies. If there’d been only three, then she would’ve thought it was her team-daring a rescue, but seven? Ino clung to Megumi-san’s hand, and rested her head against it. “I hope it’s over soon.”
That, at least, was the truth. The explosives going off over their heads was unnerving, and Ino had no desire to be buried in rubble. Not on her first B rank mission. Talk about embarrassing. And deathly.
“Onee-sa-”
Megumi-san raised her hand sharply. Ino shut up, and just stared the same direction as she was, trying to strain her ears to hear anything. More tags going off, the distant shouts of people.
“Ino-kun.” Megumi-san’s voice was cool, controlled, and resolute. “Our watchers have left the area.”
She blinked. Her real name? “Onee-sama?” Ino didn’t dare break her cover; not when she couldn’t tell even how many watchers they’d had.
“We’re getting out,” Megumi-san said, forcing herself off the bed. “Quickly.”
Ino’s chin rose. “Your injuries first,” she insisted.
Megumi-san paused, glancing at her, eyes assessing for a moment before nodding once. “As quickly as you can. Don’t drain yourself--we might have to fight.”
-0-
Sweat was beginning to sneak its way down the back of his shirt. Chouji paid it little mind though-his attention firmly on moving when Asuma-sensei said to, stopping when he gestured, and using Henge no Jutsu at a moment’s notice.
Using it so often made it harder to remember-fingers wanting to grow clumsy, tired of following the same patterns-but he focused, and did it. Kamiya-san hadn’t wanted them to do this part but Asuma-sensei had said it would be good practice.
It was more tiring than he’d thought it would be. Shikamaru just behind him, Chouji knew without looking that his eyes would be intent and deadly serious. No time for chips now, or cigarettes, or being lazy. Just the job.
The place, with the wooden flooring, and sliding doors was silent-most of the household asleep, and he was glad for that. It was one less that they had to worry about in-between jutsu, footsteps, and using chakra while keeping it suppressed. Multi-tasking.
“Here,” Asuma-sensei murmured, voice low enough that it was a strain to hear the words. Chouji stopped, glancing at the door, and keeping up the Henge that said they were just part of the wall, don’t notice them, nothing around but wall.
Down there was Ino. They were going down there. The distant crump of an explosion was all the signal they needed for Asuma-sensei to open the door.
In they went.
--
It was a risk. But everything was a risk. Yuugao’s explosions started going off, they’d continue at set intervals as the ANBU agents darted their way through the building to join them. Simple plans.
Asuma didn’t like it, but he was used to being on missions where he didn’t like things. You got over whining really fast when you learnt out in the middle of a war, when your Jounin sensei was less sensei and more commander. That was when you learned that whining didn’t matter.
Didn’t mean he had to like the fact that his students-his almost painfully green students-were with him when there were at least three enemy Jounin and who knew how many Chuunin just down the stairs. His sensei had never advocated keeping people out of the front lines though, so he’d brought them.
And would have to hope they were up to it. Teamwork would get them through it, that much he had confidence in. Few teams, even those with shinobi twice their age, had teamwork that came so smoothly together.
He went down first, that much at least he could do, and his kunai caught an Iwa-nin (lord, he hated Iwa-nin) in the eye. “Find them,” he snapped, blocking a strike from another, “and get them out of here.”
--
Easier by far to burst in and race through the building, the sprawling gardens, the well-kept halls, than to have snuck in, like a thief-like a ninja--and far less use of resources. The screaming, though, she could have done without.
Not that it kept her from detonating another blast as she darted around another corner. Her hair flying out behind her. The ceiling was the best place to run, no traffic, and in a panic, few people looked up before it was too late to really tell just what it was that had gone past them.
A few seconds was all they needed to get by. So far, few had been injured in the blasts-they’d planned that too. Civilians, well, no need to kill more of them than they had to. Bad for business. Another corner and Kouhei set of their next round. The blasts echoed through the building, loud but fading into background noise as they ran, following instructions that they’d been given by a mouse.
The door was right where they’d been told it would be. Corpses lay out on the stairs as they ran down the ceiling, dealing with the tilt in gravity with a simple bit of chakra smoothing the motion. Yuugao cracked another detonator in her hand, and flung herself off the ceiling, landing on the floor with her katana already out, and joining in the fray.
Blood flew.
--
All out battle, Chouji was quickly coming to realize, as he did a quick Kawarimi and got out of the way of an Iwa-nin with a rank higher than his, was different than one-on-one. Somehow that fact hadn’t occurred to him before.
Or the fact that his family’s jutsu were close to useless in the middle of a building-even worse, while they were in the basement. The only thing it would do would be to make him an easier target. Chouji dodged, using chakra to up his strength and smashed a punch into the stomach of a ninja too slow to get away from him.
He dropped like a stone. Chouji slit his throat. He didn’t like it, but Asuma-sensei had been quite firm-they were to leave no enemy alive behind them. People only got their allies killed that way.
“Pay attention,” Shikamaru snapped, as his friend caught a ninja Chouji hadn’t noticed was ready to attack. Chouji grinned tightly, his kunai held tight, as he dispatched that ninja as well, letting Shikamaru reclaim his shadow just in time to use it to smash a ninja into the wall. Ow.
Blood was warm on his hands, but so far none of it was his. Teamwork. Right. They could do this. He just wished they hadn’t had to.
-0-
Green chakra, pale like the first grass of spring, spilled from her hands, throwing her face into sharp relief and gave her light enough to see the injuries that Megumi-san had sustained. Sweat dripped down her face, down the middle of her back, as she worked. Ino didn’t care-her world had narrowed down to the chakra she was using, the injuries, and keeping her concentration steady.
Distantly, she was aware that there were sounds of battle, but Ino forced it out of her mind. It didn’t matter right this second, so she had to ignore it. She wasn’t good enough to pay attention to anything else but the injuries right in front of her.
Her head was dizzy by the time she stopped pouring chakra, exactly the way that Shizune-sensei had shown her, into Megumi-san’s injuries, watching as many of the smaller wounds disappeared entirely, and the deeper cuts closed, looking much better, but not entirely gone. The bruises were left mostly untouched, having decided that the cuts were more urgent to get rid of.
Ino let the flickering green glow around her hands fade, retaining just enough sense to run them over her knees, getting rid of some of the ache, before sinking back, lowering her head, and just breathing. Almost drained, she wasn’t going to be able to do much more for Megumi-san in terms of healing.
A hand came to rest on her head. Ino leaned against it for a moment, before forcing herself up and away, getting labouriously to her feet, and biting back the whimper of pain her back let off. It did not appreciate the abuse she’d been putting it through.
“How long have you been studying medical jutsu?” Megumi-san asked and Ino couldn’t figure out what the tone she was using meant.
She struggled to get her thoughts in order. “A few months?” Ino said, leaning against the far wall and forcing herself to stretch out sore muscles. Chakra mostly gone or not, she was at least in better physical shape at the moment than Megumi-san.
Of course, Megumi-san was a Jounin, so that might be wrong. Ino didn’t spare that thought another moment. Didn’t have the time, needed to get as many of the kinks worked out as she could. Which wasn’t many in all honesty. She needed sleep, a hot bath, and more chakra. Her head ached.
“Months,” Megumi-san said getting up, a bit stiff and slowly, but looking as far as Ino could tell in the dim room-true dark was the tunnels they were facing next-as if she were moving easier. “You’re a fast learner.”
Ino flushed slightly. “Just simple cuts is about my level right about now,” she said not sure what else there was to say to that. A slow learner just got people killed. She didn’t want people dead. At least, not those on her side. “Sorry I can’t do more.”
“I’m glad for this much,” Megumi-san said firmly. “Don’t worry about it.”
That made her feel a bit better, and she forced the matter out of her mind-they had more important things to worry about. “We need to get out of here,” Ino said, watching Megumi-san check her body over. “Do we want to wait and see if it’s a rescue, or just other people who’re going after them too.”
Megumi-san turned over that, looking like she was about to answer before stiffening, glancing at the door that kept them safe, and biting out an order.
“Get down!” she snapped as the door burst open, spilling light into the room, and completely ruining what vision they’d managed to get in the dark.
Ino flung herself to the ground, rolling to tuck herself into the smallest target possible. Her eyes watered as she tried to get a good view, but Megumi-san was moving so fast Ino could barely track her as the man came in, spotted her, and had just turned to look for Megumi-san-
When he fell to the ground, his neck snapped, and Megumi-san looking grimly pleased. “We’ll have weapons at least,” she said, kneeling next to the corpse and searching through his pouches.
Ino swallowed. “I could barely see you move,” she said, getting to her feet. “And you’re so injured still.”
“Training lets you ignore pain,” Megumi-san said, pulling out kunai, some wickedly curved shuriken, and even better, some bandages and the small pills that Ino knew were either chakra pills, or pain pills. “I’m normally faster.”
They got ready, Megumi-taking more of the weapons than Ino did, and downing a few of the pain pills. While she did that, Ino knelt by the tunnel, prying the opening wide with her fingertips.
“Take these,” Megumi-san said, forcing two little round pills into her hand. “Dry swallow, we don’t have water. That’s our tunnel, is it?”
Behind them, the door was still open. Ino did what she was told, there was no time for arguing. “Oh,” she said, sounding revolted after swallowing against the bitter metallic taste, “let’s not do that again. Yeah, we’re going down. Do you think you can get the opening shut when you go down?”
Extra bit of precaution. Anything helped.
“I’ll deal with the panel,” Megumi-san said, shooing her on. “Go, the long we’re here, the longer we’re in danger.” And they weren’t up for a real fight.
Ino dropped into the tunnel, wincing as she jarred her knees, and moved forward a few feet before twisting her head to peer back as Megumi-san sealed them into the dark. She was starting to really hate the dark. Taking a deep breath, Ino made herself stop thinking about anything but the route they’d have to take. It was her memory, after all, that was needed now.
They moved out.
Behind her, the sounds of battle, friend-or-foe, she didn’t know, were fading as they put distance between them and the room they’d been held. Megumi-san was breathing in short pants, and Ino glanced over her shoulder, frowning. Her hands ached, her knees ached, it’d get a lot worse before it got better, and they had to keep going. There was no time to stop.
They couldn’t risk someone following after them. They had to move. But she didn’t like that Megumi-san was already so injured, speed was of the essence, and so she paused.
“Do you want me to see if I can patch you up a bit more?” she asked, a bit diffidently.
“No,” Megumi-san said with a shake of her head that Ino felt more than saw. “Save your chakra, I’ll make it as I am.”
She nodded, torn between wanting to help more, and being glad that she didn’t have to try in the pitch dark of the tunnels. “Yes, Onee-sama.”
“Good,” Megumi-san said, and they kept moving, crawling through the tunnel, and let the darkness swallow them.
-0-
Blood dripped from his knuckles, his breathing was slightly fast, but nothing to worry about, and Asuma was feeling a good bit better than he had been for the last few days.
Nothing like violence as stress relief. Dodging a Katon jutsu-what the hell kind of idiot played with fire inside a building?-Asuma took care of that by kneeing the other shinobi in the gut and then breaking his nose and shoving the bone shards into the man’s brain.
It was a painful death.
Shikamaru was dealing with one on a set of stairs, his shadow locking the higher ranked man in place while Chouji broke the shinobi’s neck. Efficient. Not as fast as they could be, but he was glad to see that their teamwork was back to its usual high standard. He didn’t have the time to worry about them, not in the middle of battle.
“Watch out,” Yuugao told him, her mask firmly in place, as she skewered a kunoichi who’d been behind him. “Your kids are fine. It’d be embarrassing if you weren’t.”
He barked a laugh at that. “I’ve been taking care of myself longer than you have.” That was all the time he had to speak before his world narrowed down to enemies, allies, and getting rid of people who were doing their best to kill him while he did his best to kill them back.
Bloody game, and no one was keeping score. He got separated from the rest, letting Dai squeak little directions in his ears in-between braining another shinobi, and the ever important need to dodge-no sign of Yakushi, he noted, probably fled the area-and as he followed the instructions of a mouse (some days, it just wasn’t worth trying to make things sound less weird) there was less fighting for him to do.
Good. It meant that between the ANBU and his team they’d been dragging most of the shinobi down here out of position and away from the girls. Down another flight of stairs-how many floors did this basement have? He’d counted three levels so far-and he paused upon finding an open door half way down the hall.
A sandaled foot was sticking out the open door-the door that Dai had sworn had the girls in it, and Asuma picked up his pace, swearing-they hadn’t been armed, if there’d been more of them, then-
The man, an Iwa-nin from his hitae-ite, was the only one in the room. He gripped the door frame with one hand, surveying the place. The corpse had been very neatly and thoroughly scavenged from.
A grin touched his lips. It meant that they were still thinking. And that at least one of them was able and willing to use weapons still. Asuma knelt, noticing the absence of painkillers-at least one of them was injured then-and soldier pills.
Armed and dangerous. Sounded good to him. Asuma glanced back at the door, down the hall, and listened to the sounds of fighting. He didn’t want to get trapped in this room. Staying here then wasn’t an option.
He wasn’t bad at tracking, but he wasn’t the best at it either, better at brute force solutions and thinking himself out of a tight spot. Lucky for him (and Ino and Kotone) he had someone with him who was good at tracking.
“Dai,” he murmured to the mouse who’d taken refuge in his shirt when the fighting had started. “Can you find which way the girls went?”
There was a good bit of squirming as the little mouse wriggled out of his shirt, landing on the floor with a little plop and shaking his head as he scurried through the room, scenting the air. “They’re both hurt,” Dai reported after a moment. “There’s two types of blood in the air, and I recognize Kotone’s.”
Asuma wasn’t smiling now. Killing intent rode the air like the calm before the storm. He’d hoped that Ino would be left alone, that her youth would protect her long enough for them to get her out without having to deal with any of the darker side of being captured. She was so green.
“Go on,” he said, wrestling his temper under control. It would help no one if he lost his temper.
It was several minutes, time that Asuma spent further inspecting the corpse-recent, not yet having hit rigor mortis, and the neck had been broken cleanly, it had to be Megumi’s handiwork-before Dai spoke up near the far wall.
“They went out through here,” the mouse squeaked. Asuma glanced at the wall; it looked like any other, but underneath the underneath was a basic tenant for a reason. He found the panel in a few minutes, helped out by Dai’s nose.
He tried moving it. It stayed shut.
Asuma frowned at the wall thoughtfully, probing with his chakra at it and finding a twinge that felt a lot like Konoha-based work. “Megumi’s got this door trapped nine ways to hell, doesn’t she?” It made him feel a bit better to know she was still capable of doing work like that. Always a good sign.
Peace had made him slow too. Of course she would. “We need to catch them where the tunnel opens up,” he said, lifting the mouse up and setting him on his shoulder. “Can you, once we get outside, follow their trail.”
Dai considered that thoughtfully. “Chakra-signatures,” he said slowly, “Kotone-sama’s is muted but present, I should be able to follow it.”
“Good, ca--” he started, cutting off the rest of his sentence when Shikamaru and Chouji arrived at the door. They were bloodied, but a quick glance told him that their injuries were nothing serious.
“Where is she?” Shikamaru asked, taking in the room with a glance. Chouji’s face was no less anxious.
“They pulled their own escape stunt,” Asuma said, feeling relief flood through him. “We’re getting out of here, leave the clean up to the nice ANBU, and go see if we can catch them before they collapse.” He hated to dim their smiles, but couldn’t keep this information from them. “Both of them are hurt, so be careful when we find them-depending on how bad it is, they might not recognize you as an ally at first.”
Both of them nodded. Asuma shoved them out the door as Dai scrambled into his shirt again. He was almost getting used to that sensation.
“Clever girls.”
--
Previous Chapter // Chapter List // Next Chapter