Fandom Redemption [Closed] [Graverobber141/arbus]

[arbus]

Looking up from his book, Kakashi took a long moment to take in Sasuke's expression. From behind him, the others emerged, with Tenzo making up the rear and conspicuously avoiding his gaze. He snapped Icha Icha shut, stored it in the pockets of his robe and promised himself a good, long reading session after this tedious ordeal was over.

"Let's, then."

Once again, they traveled in the rhombus formation Kakashi had allotted the day before. Once again, he was clad in the impractical Hokage robes, and as they left the cover of the grove and started over the open fields, the cloth dragged behind Kakashi, heavy with soaked-up water. The procession was eerily quiet; Tenzo parted from them halfway to join the ANBU troops, and they did share no more words, just a last glance before he became a quickly dwindling spot on the horizon. With a hand sign towards Boar, Kakashi veered to the left and then reduced his speed, until he was at level with Sasuke.

"Sasuke", he started. On the horizon, the outlines of Sound's walls grew; built like a stronghold on top of a precipitous cliff, it's stone greyish-black from storms and mud and soot. Behind it, in the east, the sun was a watery half-sphere, shedding its diffuse light over the tips of the roofs. He had waited for this conversation to take place, timed it so they would not be able to prolong it, ever uncomfortable with such topics. "Tell me what you expect upon our arrival. What Orochimaru will do. What he is likely to think."

 

[Graverobber141]

Sasuke's dark eyes shifted only momentarily to take in Kakashi, before they drifted back to observe the ever approaching Sound Village. He could already make out movement upon the walls, and the closer they got, the more he began to sense a few extra presences around them; they were being followed and watched, almost carelessly, as if the Sound ninja wanted to be known.

So this was it. Just a short breadth of time, and he would be staring into the face of a literal demon from his past.

His jaw clenched and it took a moment for him to unhinge it for speech. "A power play. I imagine he'll keep us waiting, or meet us with a large envoy. Something in an attempt to unsettle us. He'll want to show us how much control he has over the situation." A bitter, scorched scoff tore itself from his lips, and his voice was taut with his next words. "Everything is about control and power to him."

He took a few heartbeats to consider the rest of his assessment, Yamato's warning still fresh in his mind. If Orochimaru wanted to kill the Hokage, weaken Konoha, face Sasuke, now would be the time to do it. Yet even in the aftermath, Sound would be crushed by the Leaf and surely Sand would join the fray, even if the other villages stood idly by. The snake sannin would lose all he had built, and while he certainly wouldn't care about the casualties, he wouldn't gain anything: at least not anything Sasuke could see.

"He's too clever to risk actually trying anything," Sasuke finally finished. "But he's going to taunt us, if only to prove that he knows we won't react."

They were near now, and with the gates of the village coming in full view, a few figures could be seen stationed outside, waiting for them, but Orochimaru was not among them. Standing in the center, a presumed leader, was a man shrouded by a black cloak, hood pulled up, and face covered by a hawk mask. Behind him were a handful of other unmasked guards, clad in the Sound's uniform (more were stationed on the walls, and throughout the city, Sasuke imagined), but it was the orange-haired giant on Hawk's flank that drew Sasuke's attention.

Jugo. He was also dressed in a black cloak, a metal collar lined with seals peeking from underneath the fabric.

Sasuke was gripping his fist so tightly he thought he might break his own bones, and a rage steamed violently, dangerously in his blood, and it was so hard, so bitter to bite down and swallow. Ever since he had encountered Karin and Suigetsu, he had wondered what happened to the last member of Taka.

Jugo wouldn't even look at him. In fact, Jugo was looking past the whole envoy, staring into a void.

"Welcome, Hokage-sama. Uchiha Sasuke," Hawk spoke in greeting, his voice maddeningly smug. "I am to escort you to the tower--" His head tilted to indicate the large, imposing, jagged structure that jutted out of the center of the village like a spike out of the ground. "--to meet with Orochimaru-sama."

 

[arbus]

Kakashi hummed his agreement; Sasuke's assessment coincided with his own. This did not come as a surprise, but losened the tension in his shoulders nevertheless. He was too clever, or perhaps too wary a person to allow himself any false sense of security, but the outlines of his plans sharpened, lay comfortably in his hands, and he felt the same contentment he did in the midst of battle, when his mind had stopped racing, had gathered a satisyingly accurate view of all the possible scenarios.

Still, this was a high-risk high-reward scenario; calculated recklessness, as his friends used to call it. Orochimaru had no way of knowing about the crumbling alliance -- it was the ace upon his sleeve, this bluff, the facade to assure all of their safety. It had been Tenzo's job to report on Orochimaru, his movements, his correspondence, his intel gathering. Their lives depended on the accuracy of his work, and Kakashi trusted him blindly.

"For all his intelligence, Orochimaru lacks the capability to look underneath the underneath, if simply because he routinely underestimates all he deems infiror to him. That was how you killed him that first time, wasn't it?"

Kakashi offered a reassuring smile, but as the expression on Sasuke's face grew taut, he followed his gaze. He took in the tall, burly lad that seemed only vaguely familiar. There was no time to ask any more questions now, as their group halted in an appropriate distance before the guards. Kakashi stopped before the hawk-masked man, and after taking him in, he let his eyes travel over the guards on the walls and the ground, before settling his gaze in the masked man.

"A welcoming commitee", he said with a friendly smile, completely ignoring the smugness in the others tone, unfazed by the fact he kept his face hidden beneath a clay mask, which could be considered a provocation in itself, "how very nice. Thank you, if you would be so kind."

 

[Graverobber141]

And Orochimaru should have been left dead, Sasuke thought, gaze trailing over his former teammate. Every member of Taka was used by Orochimaru in some way, but Jugo was the purest of the bunch, had only wanted to keep himself from harming others, and now...he was nothing more than a shell. What did they do to you?

"It would be my pleasure." In response to Kakashi's request, Hawk inclined his head, before turning on his heel to lead them into the village. Behind them, the gates closed with a loud clattering of metal, and after settling, the air grew thick with a palpable, eery silence. The array of guards filtered in around them as they walked, and Sasuke couldn't help but fill boxed-in. The swordsman at the front of their envoy, he saw, was also tense, his shoulders rigid, and his eyes watched the rooftops, crooks and crannies of the alleyways with careful precision. Sasuke understood the wariness; he was more threatened by what he couldn't see instead of was laid out before them.

The streets were devoid of any civilian presence, but lined to the side with more soldiers that studied them with rock faces as they passed. The buildings were dark, mostly made of stone, and very bleak: no decorations, no flourish, and strictly militaristic. It was hardly a village but a compound, a fortress. War machine came to mind, and glancing at the hard, statue-like expressions of Sound's inhabitants, Sasuke wondered bitterly how many were here by choice.

The tower, when they arrived at its base, seemed to reach toward the sky; an impressive, fortified structure home to many secrets, Sasuke was sure. Their extra escort thinned out once they were taken inside, led up a set of winding stairs, and halted in a hallway outside a large metal door.

"Before being granted an audience with Orochimaru-sama," Hawk stated, standing like a sentry before the entrance, "We will confiscate any and all weapons, and use the seal in the center of the floor to check for chakra." He splayed his hands out, motioning toward the intricate lines and characters engraved in the stone before him.

Being first in line, there was a very aggressive snort from Satoru, his hand clasped possessively over his chokuto. Of course the swordsman would find the idea of being separated from his main defense absurd, coupled with the personal significance of the weapon itself. Sasuke immediately stepped forward, already shrugging off his katana into his hand, eyes kept on Satoru to offer reassurance. And behind his bangs, the rinnegan in his left eye was already activated, scanning the seal for danger as he stepped forward along with the swordsman--

He barely heard the uttered, "Oh, what the fuck?!" before the blinding flash of light became overwhelming, the world around them tumbled inward and broke, colors melting, dissolving, then they were falling, accelerating down and down, a white noise blaring in their eardrums, thrumming with static energy. Flashes before their eyes like moving paintings: scenes they didn't recognize, couldn't comprehend, for they were like molding worlds slipping by, and eventually both had to close their eyes shut or be consumed by the sheer omnipotence of what they saw.

And then it was as if they were spat out, landing hard, rolling fast against the ground in different directions.

 

[arbus]

"Watch out!" The shout came from Sasuke's right, but it was too late, the clash with the masked man flying towards him in high-speed seemingly inevitable, but then --

With a "Uaaaah, Uchiha incoming!", a blur of black and grey flickered, only a hair's breadth before Sasuke, into nothingness ... only to re-appear to his left, dancing on his feet in a feeble attempt to keep his balance. Loosing the fight, the man stumbled -- and fell onto his ass. Only for a second though, as he bounced right back to his feet. Behind the clay mask, which faintly resembled the face of a monkey, white and adorned with yellow markings, the spinning tomoe in a pair of sharingan speeded up as they took Sasuke in.

"Oh, good", the voice came slightly muffled from behind the mask, but did not lack in surprised merriment, "reinforcements. Damn it, Cat", he spit, suddenly inclining his head, his attention obviously drawn away by something. "I am on my way. Just picking up the new guys." He huffed, shook his head in disbelief, and then stemmed his hands into his sides to laugh. "I had no idea we had an Uchiha undercover in Sand. What's with the weird clothes?" The deafening crash of thunder sounded above them and he winced. "Gah, anyway, more of the introductions later." He spun to take in the other newcomer, about to gesture him to come over, when a shinobi, clad in the beige colors of Sand, gauze wrapped around his otherwise bald head, leapt out from behind a crumbling mud wall that was standing in the middle of a turbid field.

A leap, a war cry, but Monkey was on the move, his tanto drawn and buried inside the man's guts in the blink of an eye. Simultaneously, from a farther distance, a wooden dome erupted seemingly out of nowhere; a moment later, a hailstorm of shuriken rained down upon it, thrown from two more of the enemy shinobi, who also wore Sand uniforms, though they only vaguely resembled what Satoru had been wearing the other day, were of simpler, less sturdy material.

Overhead, thunder was growling, lightning shooting across the sky. A familiar chirping sounded, cackling madly in the howling wind. Blue lightning illuminated the dark, cloud-ridden sky on the very edge of the same cliff on which Sound Village had stood, erect and impenetrable, just moments ago. In its stead, two shinobi, engaged in a fierce one-on-one battle, clashed and danced apart on the undeveloped earth.

"Okay so we really gotta move", Monkey said, spinning around and churning off blood from his tanto with a swift swoop. "You can't see him right now, but that guy hiding underneath the firewood is Cat. He's in a bit of a pickle, so I'd appreciate it if one of you could help him get rid of those shinobi. You", he was pointing at Satoru now, "move. Thanks. And you, come with me. We need to push back the --"

Before he could finish the sentence, there was more movement, and across the gentle hills of the Land of Grass, now muddy from a heavy downpour and completely devoid of snow, the silhouettes of a dozen Sand shinobi appeared, rushing right at them, wielding kunai and the determined looks of men out to kill. "Fuck", Monkey cursed with vigor, "you got this, yeah? Come on!", before he was off, flickering across the battlefield to fell one shinobi after the other with precise hits of his tanto, aided by an elegantly performed array of shunshin, easily matching Satoru's speed, and impossible to follow with the normal eye.

 

[Graverobber141]

Confusion, and there was no time to sort any of it out. Torso coated in mud, Sasuke barely had enough time to grab his katana and push himself off the wet earth, catching a glimpse of the shine of red eyes--how? His subconscious raced, absorbing the voice that sounded so familiar, yet distant--before, registering the dire situation, his mind went on auto-drive, shifting into the absolute clarity of battle. His heart pounded wildly, thrumming like a drum in his chest, and throwing a glance at Satoru, he growled: "Go."

The swordsman's grey eyes were narrowed, his teeth gritted, but he nodded a confirmation, and a moment later, after clasping his hands together in the hand sign of the serpent, he was gone in a flash, chokuto snapped into his grip.

Slinging the sheath around his shoulder, Sasuke drew his own blade, and darted behind Monkey, a blur of black cloak, green vest, and flash of blinding metal. There was no hesitance. Slicing into one of the enemy shinobi, blood splattering on his clothes--he could feel its warmth seeping into the fabric, smell the heavy iron in the liquid--his mind didn't register what was happening, only commanded his body to move and survive. He was nothing more than a machine. Another cut, another body to fall before him. Three of the enemy had hurdled together for a coordinate attack, and waiting for them to close in, Sasuke formed a few hand signs, before spitting out a large fire ball; he felt the heat kiss his face, could hear the pained screaming, smell burnt flesh as the bodies tumbled down a small incline, but he was already moving again.

Across the way, seconds before, Satoru's sword went flying past Cat, impaling the chest of a Sand ninja moving in for an attack, slicing completely through so it exited the body, and coated in fresh blood, snapped back into the swordsman's outstretched hand. It didn't hit him, not in that moment, that he had taken his first life; no, he was moving with intent, adrenaline clouding all his thoughts but that one, echoing instinct, uttered so perfectly by the only familiar thing in this outlandish place: go. He was practically dancing across the battlefield. Dunking below a slash from a kunai, he sunk his chokuto into a heart once again, turned on his heel, and summoning up a sharpened gust of wind in his left hand, cut the exposed throat of another that had tried to flank him. Freeing his blade, he was once more on the move.

 

[arbus]

Caught by surprise, his feline mask askew from the hurry to duck behind the next cover sprouting out of his hands, Cat exclaimed a "Thanks!" before he readjusted his mask, using the cover provided by Satoru to create distance between himself and the brunt of the battle. A middle-range fighter, tribes of wood sprouted out of his limbs to pierce through the enemies, taking two in a row by clashing their heads against the mud wall and blocking the path of one springing in the wind style user's way.

"Nice one", Monkey called across the battle field, his whitish face directed towards Sasuke, blurring out of vision as he evaded an incoming attack from behind. They raged across the battlefield with a power akin the storm above them, four of them alone diminishing the onslaught of Sand shinobi, reduced to a few single, desperate figures now as another man entered the battlefield, dashing in from the cliff, trailing lighting in his hand, its screeches drowning out all other sounds.

"Cat!", he yelled, like a command, prompting the brown-haired man to form three hand signs and slap his palms together. Wood shot out of the ground, racing its way towards the remaining Sand nin, and the wielder of lighting leapt onto it, sandals skidding over wood as he trailed his way upwards, surfing on the trunk with his left eye a glaring red orb behind the dog mask.

"Ready!", Cat shouted, over the howling of the storm and the cries of chidori. In the same moment, a hand grabbed onto Sasuke's arm, and Monkey was pulling at him, and they were moving but fast, and then they were out of the fallout zone, out of the cluster of bodies. Monkey shouted: "Careful!", but before they could take a breath one of those wooden domes was scooping them up like an overgrown spoon, and Monkey laughed, a sound edged with hysteria and desperation and relief.

"Heads up", the man trailing the lightning yelled at Satoru, silver hair flapping wildly in the wind -- the stem he was surfing grew another branch, shooting off in Satoru's direction like a hand extended, and then the man was diving, crashing his palm into the soaked earth, mud splattering everywhere as the lightning exploded, a ball growing in perimeter so quick it gave the remaining Sand shinobi no chance to flee. It took their bodies, ate away at their convulsing muscles and fried their every cell until they fell, and remained still on the scorched earth.

The wood retracted, was gone.

The silence that followed was as deafening as the sounds of battle had been. Breath was suddenly loud to the ears, and the man stood, bend over and panting and clutching his wrist.

"And that's the Captain", Monkey offered, brushing off bits of grass and ignoring the gore hanging from his elbow.

Cat made a bolt towards them. "You alright?"

"Close call", Monkey commented. The captain steadied himself and turned, the sharingan tracing over each one of them in a careful sweep, before his shoulders hunched. "Close enough."

"Without you guys, we would've been sushi. And not the good kind, either", Monkey said as he took his mask off to wipe his sweat-slicked forehead with the back of his hand, smearing dirt and blood all over the place. He blinked, and the sharingan were replaced by a pair of black eyes. "My name's Shisui", he said with an exhausted grin on his face. "I have no idea whose bastard you are that we've never met, but I'm glad you found it in you to safe your next of kin."

 

[Graverobber141]

'My name's Shisui.'

Watching the other Uchiha take off his mask, seeing the dark hair, dark eyes, a man that was a ghost, Sasuke felt--blurred, trapped in a dream, the surreal sensation hazily rising in him along with one steady mantra thrumming through his conscious: This wasn't real--this couldn't be real.

You're dead, he wanted to say, yet the words stalled on his tongue, some failsafe in his mind keeping him from blurting them out, but he couldn't say anything else, because his thoughts were racing, one realization piling onto the other.

If Shisui was alive--
His brother. Where was was his brother? His stomach tightened and coiled, his chest felt like it was flooded with lead, and he found it extraordinary hard just to intake a breath.
His father.
His mother.

He tasted bile in the back of his throat, and some distant, quiet part of himself was bitterly laughing at how he had stomached the smell of burnt flesh, but this was what wanted to make him puke: this panic settling in him, because because--

The massacre.

Bodies strewn everywhere. Blood seeping into the crevices of the floorboards. Red eyes that haunted him like a devil constantly at the back of his mind.

Somehow he managed not to expel his small breakfast, but he dropped to a knee. It was an odd, harrowing sensation, this mix of adrenaline flooding his veins, overriding his body, and the disconnect from reality overtaking his nervous system. Some buried part of him managed to register that this was the absolute worse time to be rendered immobilized by this overbearing sense of shock.

"Satoshi," he recognized the voice. Satoru was at his side, placing a hand on his shoulder, studying him with grey eyes filled with concern that went deeper than the surface. "I told you not to exert yourself; you used up way too much chakra trying to get us here."

"I'm all right," Sasuke, now proclaimed Satoshi, managed to mutter out. Scrapping the blood from his katana on the wet grass, he slid the weapon into its sheath, before accepting Satoru's help to stand. A self preservation instinct told him he should play the role, follow the grand actor's lead. "Introductions can wait. We should depart before any of their reinforcements show up."

The expression upon the swordsman's face became discernible, his eyes flickering to take stock of the bodies strewn about the battlefield, but he nodded in agreement. Gaze settling on that familiar mane of silver hair, Satoru lifted a brow, asked: "Captain?"

 

[arbus]

„You don‘t look too good, though“, Shisui said, both eyebrows raised sceptically. He had taken a step towards the black-haired shinobi, ready to give a helping hand if needed.

„That‘s not a nice thing to say“, Cat chided, though it had no bite. Too drained did the black-haired man look, his face white as a sheet, expression tight and intense with something resembling shock, or pain. „Satoshi, eh? Here“, he slipped a hand in his pouch to offer a soldier pill on the top of his open palm. „Be careful, though, you‘ll be crashing hard once the effect wears off.“

The dog-masked man, the captain, had produced a compass from the pocket of his pants and was studying it intently as he stepped into their circle. He raised his mask-clad face after a moment, clearly calculating their options. „There is a quarry south-west of here. We can go there for shelter and rest.“ He hummed. „No way to retrieve the bodies, though.“

„And then what?“, Cat asked.

„Konoha‘s a little under a day‘s travel away“, Shisui suggested, somewhat hopeful.

They all looked battered; a more persistent grime clung to their skin and uniforms underneath the blood and sweat from the recent battle.

„We‘ll see“, the dog-masked man said and took off in the aforementioned direction. Shisui groaned. „You know what that means“, he told Cat, re-applying his monkey mask, „that‘s Hound for We‘ll push on.“

But he did not hesitate to follow, and soon they left the stench of blood and piss and defecation behind, the chaos and rush of the fight like a bad dream in their wake. They entered the fir forest a short while later, which was quiet, peaceful almost, dashing over thin branches and changing to the ground when the trees would not hold their weight any longer, through a thick morning mist that made it hard to breath, left residue on their faces, tiny droplets of water in the strands of their hair.

The quarry lay in a glen, protected to every side by earth walls. They skidded to a halt in its midst, and as soon as they had stopped, Monkey and Cat branched out.

„There‘s a cave“, Cat called, standing next to a sprawling bush and brushing its thorny branches aside with one arm. „It‘s small, but I think we‘ll fit. No fire, though.“

 

[Graverobber141]

The stench, more so than the sight, was what Satoru found to be overwhelming, like a plague diseasing his senses, and it was so much more potent, concentrated than the death he had smelled during the war. The loss of Takeshi had left him violently, wildly broken, yet this was something else; staring out at the dozens dead before them--some having been ended by his own hand--he felt the absence of emotion: a hollowed, dull ache at the center of his consciousness, where his higher functioning was supposed to be processing what just happened. What he just did. But watching Sasuke crumble before him, come crashing down with a vulnerability he had not know the man to possess, he knew one of them had to stay grounded, and in some fathomless irony, he found himself thrust into the position.

At least his partner was still there enough to let Satoru smooth their way through this shitshow they had found themselves in, and instead of actually consuming the pill, Sasuke muttered a thanks, popped it into his mouth, and when backs were turned, spat it quietly back out into his hand, sliding it inside a weapons pouch, for which Satoru was grateful, because in his condition, he imagined pouring adrenaline onto that panic would be like tossing gasoline on fire.

With Sasuke leaning on Satoru for support, the two followed the three ANBUs' lead. The body weight was pulled off his shoulder partway into the travel, yet Sasuke's arm remained wrapped around Satoru, and his eyes were shut, his mouth taut and brows drawn together in concentration. When his visible eyelid lifted slightly, Satoru glimpsed the color of dark red, before it faded into black, and the Uchiha's jaw set rigidly, before he withdrew from the swordsman completely.

Shit. It wasn't working, that teleportation ability of the rinnegan, which meant--Fuck. It was hard to bite down this panic that wanted to overtake Satoru, but he did it on will alone; without a clear mind, finding a solution would be impossible, and right now, he had to make sure they lived through this encounter.

Once they made it to the cave, Satoru drew his sword to help brush aside some of the thorns, allowing the others to enter, and cast Sasuke a once-over to judge how he was holding up as he passed; he still wasn't completely there, but the initial shock had faded to the point of allowing basic functionality. Sheathing the chokuto once he had slid inside the cave, the swordsman looked around the gathered group, before crouching next to his (by lack of choice) Uchiha, who had sat down, back against the wall, gazing at the trio.

"As you gathered, this is Satoshi," Satoru began quick introductions, adopting the strict, down-to-business tone that he had heard Takeshi don a thousand times for missions. And as he still had little idea of what they had dragged themselves into, he settled on also giving himself a pseudonym, "My name is Ryusuke. I'm pleased we managed to get to you guys in time. Mind filling us in on your mission progress? We didn't have time for a briefing."

 

[arbus]

Once inside the cave, Cat reinforced the naturally growing bushes before the cave's entrance with his wood style, creating a thickly leaved screen to shield them from view. He sat down next to Shisui, who had taken off his mask, removing his own as well, revealing the smooth face of a considerably younger version of Yamato. Easily recognizable with his face plate, his features were much more guileless, and he wore his brown hair at shoulder-length. They passed a water bottle back and forth between them, clearly relieved for the chance to rest their weary muscles.

"If you are pleased, imagine how we feel", Shisui said. He bumped his shoulder against Yamato. "That's Tenzo, and the captain is Kakashi."

"Please refer to us with our code names when we are in the field", Tenzo said. His eyes flickered away from Kakashi, where they had rested for most of the time since they had entered the cage. The silver-haired man was crouching with his back turned, dog mask placed beside his feet. Tilting his head back, he poured water from a flask to rub his face clean of the thick layer of sweat, before taking a few, thirsty gulps. He tugged up the fabric of his mask over damp skin, turned, and held the half-emptied bottle out towards Ryusuke.

"Good to meet you", he said. "Ryusuke. Satoshi."

Like Yamato, this version of Kakashi was much younger, in his early twenties at most. None of the normally so easily discernible creases were visible in the corners of his mismatched eyes, which lay heavy-lidded and wary on the two man before him.

"What happened to your contact?", he asked. "Didn't you meet up with him?"

For a second, Shisui's brows creased in confusion, his eyes flickering to Tenzo, whose face remained unreadable.

 

[Graverobber141]

Satoru accepted the water bottle with a small bow of his head in thanks, throwing his head back to take a drink; the gesture was to buy him time, as he raced to think of an answer to that question of Kakashi's. They had aroused suspicion, which he supposed was to be expected, considering completely useful Sunshine at his side, who was the definition of an Uchiha and still looked not fully there, their clothing, which obviously was from a different damn time period, and the fact they lacked any solid evidence to being whoever it was that these fine, younger, familiar gentlemen were expecting.

Wiping his mouth with the corner of his sleeve--a last, tiny patch that was still free of mud, blood, and sweat--he passed off the container to Sasuke, tapping him on the knee with it to draw his attention. It took a moment, but the Uchiha finally grasped the container, taking a few, long gulps. Satoru couldn't help the way his brow furrowed, the concern that flickered within his eyes. Seeing Sasuke in this vulnerable, broken state, he found it very, unexplainably odd, this feeling--urge--scratching underneath the surface of his mind that made him almost protective.

With the water bottle back in hand, acting as a sort of bridge between the two sides, Satoru sealed it and handed it back toward Kakashi. His gaze lingered on the man that had caught his attention the day before, whose face was less affected by age, and he felt a curiosity rise within, one layered with questions and invitations, but the situation was too fragile to indulge.

"The only contact we made was with the Swordsman of the Sand," Satoru said with a scoff, one of those jagged expressions tossed to the wind like a curse by soldiers whose situations became FUBAR. "The bastard here got in a few licks," He patted Sasuke's knee, "but we're lucky to have disengaged him."

 

[arbus]

Kakashi's eyes widened for the fraction of a second, but another indicator of his surprise was how the tomoe in his sharingan took up speed. Or perhaps this was due to something else; a closer scrutiny of Ryusuke's features, a more thorough look at the slumped figure beside him. Shell-shock, Kakashi thought and knew he was right, even though it didn't make any sense for an undercover agent, an elite shinobi, to be thrown by the hardships of battle like this.

"The Swordsman of the Sand", Shisui uttered, incredulous.

"A genjutsu?", Tenzo asked, leaning forward to study Satoshi's features. "The Bingo book didn't state that he used genjutsu."

"You escaped the Swordsman of the Sand?", Shisui asked in that same tone of disbelief.

Kakashi hummed. He rolled the water bottle between his hands contemplatively. "Where did he catch up with you?", he asked, just as Shisui murmured a final, somehow deflated: "The Swordsman of the fucking Sand."

"We get it, Shisui", Tenzo said. His eyebrows had vanished beneath his face plate, which only enhanced his look of irritation. Shisui turned towards him with an expression of utmost sincerity on his face. Voice grave, he replied: "I don't think you do, Tenzo."

"Enough", Kakashi muttered. He was pinching the bridge of his nose as if fighting a headache, and when he next looked up, it was with his left eye firmly closed. Both Tenzo's and Shisui's mouths snapped shut, but if they felt guilty, they didn't look it. "We need to get word to the Hokage. If the Swordsman has his fingers in this, he needs to know."

"Consider it done", Shisui said, almost merrily, as he got to his feet. The ceiling of the cave was low enough he had to crouch as he stood, and with his head inclined and his back bent he moved to the entrance, wriggling his way through the thick underbrush.

Kakashi inclined his head, his attention back on Ryusuke when he asked: "Was your cover blown?"

 

[Graverobber141]

At first, there was simply a sense of pride that rose in Satoru's chest at the group's reaction to the mention of his beloved mentor, a secret smugness kept to himself, but it cracked to reveal another layer underneath, a revelation: this is what Takeshi was born into, this was all he knew. Grey eyes studied Kakashi intently for a split moment, seeing the similarities for the first real time, and the information was pocketed for later contemplation, for his mind was already moving forward, considering his moves and options like a shogi game.

He had to be careful. Keep track of what he said, remain consistent and as vague as possible, without being too vague. Give the illusion of having information. And cling to what he was able to gather from the context of the conversation.

Satoru's brow drew together in thoughtful consideration of Kakashi's question, an expression that didn't have to be faked, as he draped an arm across his knee, while the other drummed upon his leg. "Mmm...It's hard to say for sure. I doubt it, however, or else the Swordsman would've kept on pursuing." He let out a sigh then, in relief, hand lifting to brush back his sweat-slicked hair. "I can't say what made him withdraw, but we're extremely lucky to have lost him."

Sparing a glance at Sasuke with worry that also didn't have to faked, he hoped that the Uchiha was at least listening, noting these lies being weaved. He wished he knew what to do to break that trance; it didn't make sense. During their fight, Sasuke had moved with intent, no hesitance, had for all practicality killed him, had even moved without a thought when they first entered the most recent battle, but--something clicked, like a tumbler in a lock sliding open: the moment Sasuke broke was also the moment that Shisui, also dark-haired, dark-eyed, had taken off his mask.

 

[arbus]

Kakashi shifted his weight to move into a position that allowed him to plant his back more firmly against the wall of the cave. Earlier, Tenzo had warned of the side effects of soldier pills, and Kakashi, who had only been able to retain his stamina by popping two before the fight broke out, now felt the brunt of it. He was crashing, which made it maddeningly hard to think.

Leaning his head back against the cool wall, he shut his eyes. The sharingan was throbbing from overuse, an ache that radiated into his brain, which felt swollen and sore and too big for his skull.

Because something was off with the two men before him. They wore uniforms so reminiscent of the Konoha greens, yet they had supposedly acted as undercover operatives in Sand. The quiet one looked so eerily like an Uchiha that it was hard to think of him as anything else, but Shisui did not know him. And why, why would Minamoto Takeshi attack two shinobi he thought were affiliated with Sand, if not because he exposed them as Konoha's spies?

"Senpai?"

Kakashi opened his eye again -- only the normal one, as he now needed to preserve as much chakra as possible. Tenzo was looking at him with the worried frown, which was subtly different from his angry frown, but not by a large margin. Kakashi smiled, so blatantly, inappropriately merry that it changed Tenzo's frown right into it's angry counterpart.

It came down to this: Half the military population of Sand was on their tails. His team needed all the help they could get. Paranoia or appropriate mistrust, it did not matter. He had no choice but to drag them along. The time to ask questions was not now, but later, after they made it out alive.

When Shisui slipped back into the cave, Kakashi announced: "We can't stay here. They will have begun to search the area with sensors and trackers by now. We need to get out of this forest. Out of this country. We'll head towards the Land of Hot Water."

"If they followed us all the way into Grass", Tenzo said, "what would keep them from following us into Hot Water, too?"

"Nothing", Kakashi replied blandly, "We will just have to be quicker than them."

 

[Graverobber141]

His hand tracing over the cold stone of the cave, Sasuke found himself fighting against a freezing, dark current in his own mind, and compelled by a raw, underlying panic: he had to get out of here, because here--whatever here was--was wrong. Finger bumping against a jagged piece of rock, his eyes closed, and he pressed his palm down over the edge, felt the dull pain and clung to it like a boat riding on the waves of a storm. His teeth gritted. Warm blood trinkled down his skin, and making a fist around that line of crimson, his dark gaze snapped open.

"Then let's move." Satoru's head immediately swerved to take in the Uchiha's sharpened words, which were stated like a command, and the swordsman's eyes widened in disbelief, his mouth dangling open like he wanted to say something, but Sasuke was already hunched over on his feet. Body tense, on edge, his muscles winding into strained, tight coils, he carelessly shoved his way past the lot of them, on his way toward the mouth, because he was tired of all the talking, of the tight space that made him feel locked in, trapped, and of staring into familiar faces that were wrong.

A hand dug fingers into his shoulder like claws, and the tight grip forcibly turned him around so that his hardened, guarded black eye met Satoru's stern, scolding glare. There was a lot more going on in that exchanged look, two wolves staring each other down, just shy of baring fangs, than what the swordsman actually said, voice surprisingly kept even: "Satoshi. You're not in charge here. We defer to the captain."

A beat of tense silence, then Sasuke was ripping free of the swordsman's hold, turning his back to all of them, though he didn't immediately exit, waiting with his shoulder pressed into his wall. "The captain was the one who said to move."

Behind him, Satoru was giving the trio of ANBU an apologetic look, muttering, "We'll follow your lead, offer whatever support we can."

 

[arbus]

None of them seemed to have taken offence, but Kakashi‘s grey eye, though heavy-lidded from fatigue, rested sharply on the back of Satoshi's head for a long moment. Once their clay masks of their ANBU personas were firmly set in place, they moved out of the cave, and after a few sparse instructions from Hound, set off in close formation.

Making their way out of the fir forest turned out to be a delicate ordeal, as Sand actually seemed to have deployed half of its shinobi, all in the name of making their lives miserable. Squads of Sand shinobi roamed the forest, forcing them to make more than one detour. At one point, cowering in the underbrush, Monkey made a hand sign towards Hound, obviously itching to take out the two patrols that stood, oblivious, only a few feet away from them. Hound gestured back in ANBU code, but the implication could not have been clearer: Do not engage.

Once they had crossed the border to Hot Water, left it behind them under low-hanging, grey clouds, the sightings of beige Sand uniforms shimmering through foliage grew more sparse. As Konoha shinobi, they manoeuvred the trees with ease; strategically, entering the Land of Hot Water with its dense, large stretches of broadleaf forests had been a wise decision. The relief of leaving the perils of plain, unprodected land behind hung unspoken between them. Monkey had taken the lead -- despite of Team Ro's obvious exhaustion, he still moved with an easy speed that suggested he was holding back for their sake. In fact it was Hound who was trailing behind; he came in last, the sturdy soles of his ANBU boots skidding over the barks of trees with less dexterity than usual.

Monkey leapt to a lower tree, decreasing his speed further until he was level with Satoshi. In the shadows of his mask his eyes were almost indescernible, yet they lingered on the others so eerily familiar face as he asked: "Sure you're alright, Satoshi?"

 

[Graverobber141]

No.

The bitter part of Sasuke's mind found the question laughable, because it was so evident in the storm raging inside himself. How could he be, when he was faced with this hell riding him? He had come so far, stitched up old wounds, only to have that carefully placed thread violently pulled free: to be here, a heartbeat away from that one event, that one stain he could never wipe away from his being, what had left him so irreversibly damaged it was pathetic.

"Fine," was the single word that ripped itself from his throat in response to Shisui, an aggressiveness that the man, who had been nothing but kind, certainly didn't deserve, but he felt this need to assert himself, to remind himself that he was one of most powerful shinobi in the world, that he wasn't--

--weak. Like that boy had been, who merely subjected himself to torture within the gaze of red eyes, shivering, cowering, crying. Weak. Pathetic.
Victim.

This was a foreboding nightmare, shadows crawling for his feet, and he had to wake up. Get out before it happened again.

If only he had the time to think.

It came out of nowhere, the chokuto flying past Sasuke's head, infused with wind chakra, and struck the tree behind him with a loud crack, blowing straight through the trunk, and a split second later, the lumber was crashing into the ground, cutting the two Uchiha off from the rest of the group. There was no time to reaction, for two figures were appearing from the treeline, springing a trap, and in a coordinated attack, were driving them further apart, back.

The first a rock-style user: a burly man with a shaved head, bearded jaw, who summoned wall after wall from the earth, forcing Sasuke to dance backwards, deeper inside the forest, dodging the spikes that rose up from the dirt like a hungry maw.

The second a woman talented in genjutsu and barriers: blonde hair, brown eyes, who made a barrier race around the edges of Shisui, also driving him back, away from Sasuke and the others, the air fluttering around him with the thickness of a cast genjutsu, which would pull at his mind with the beckoning of a deep slumber.

On the other side of the tree, Satoru saw that familiar sword rip once again through the air, and felt dread consume him, his gut twisting, as--like he had been summoned by Satoru's earlier assertion--the Swordsman of the Sand practically flew before him and Kakashi, and with gust of strong wind, another tree fell; cut off from Tenzo, the two were driven back, further away from the others with a relentless assault of wind, chased by the fast-moving Takeshi himself.

Lastly, Tenzo would find himself met with an unyielding storm of needles dripping with poison, two puppets biting at his heels, their controller a silver-haired man flicking the chakra strings with elegance.

 

[arbus]

Well, fuck.

Kakashi's feet skidded to a halt at the sight of the Swordsman, and for a moment he swayed on the branch, fighting for balance and clear thoughts. While, from the moment he had realized they were being ambushed, adrenaline had shot through his system, it was too small an amount, and the expected sharpening of his senses did not come. He was battle-honed enough to recognize a clever tactician when he saw one, though. A clever tactic, indeed -- swaddling them in the false sense of security before separating the team with specialized jutsu. From what he gathered through the chaos, expertly administrated by the Swordsman's team, they had either been monitored or information about Ro had leaked. Too precise was the attack plan, fine-tuned on every members' capabilities.

Those thoughts shot through his head in a blink of an eye; there was no further time to assess the situation, as he and Ryusuke were driven back by Minamoto Takeshi himself. Kakashi spun, retrieved to a farther branch, and then they dashed through the trees with wind that felt like a minor hurricane in their backs. The mighty push was irresistible, and though it clearly was part of the Swordsman's plan, Kakashi was hard-pressed not to feel at least a bit of relieve because it accelerated his movements, propelled him forwards when, in a direct confrontation in his current state, he would be fodder to the Swordsman's blade.

Ignoring his erratic heartbeat and the rush of blood in his ears, he kept going, sliding from tree to tree and mulling over his options. They would not be able to outrun Takeshi -- Kakashi certainly wouldn't, at least, and without a more decent head start, Ryusuke would be caught sooner or later, too. So he had to create a distraction, allowing Ryusuke to take flight or to fight on a more level playing field, not out of a disadvantage. Kakashi was not much more than dead weight at this point; he needed to take himself out of the equation, and be smart about it.

The foliage cleared so suddenly before his eyes that he stumbled onto the clearing with a sound of surprise. He relaxed his muscles, allowed himself to fall and roll off the floor, Ryusuke's position always in the corner of his eyes. The sharingan was throbbing like crazy, his head pounding in the same rhythm, but he skidded over the floor, spun, slapped his hands onto the ground and performed an Earth Release. A massive mud wall, ornamented with several dog's faces, shot up from the ground, shielding them from the onslaught of wind. No time to waste. With a flick of his wrist, he threw a kunai to the left to hopefully create a distraction for the Swordsman, as he himself dashed to the right.

His muscles were coiled tight; his chakra pathways strained, his whole body sore and achy with it. No chakra left after that jutsu: His chakra reserves were emptied out, dead, and if he risked any more of his stamina, he would be, too.
"Get the eye if you can", he pressed between gritted teeth as he passed the other man, leaping out on the right side of the wall. Even if he had still been able to perform a Katon, it would fire back into his face with how strong the wind was blowing in their direction. He gritted his teeth, a metallic taste in the back of his throat, the fabric of his mask dampened, a sweetly-sick smell in his nose as he sprinted, fast, aiming for the Swordsman's weapon's pouch, and then he threw a kunai trailing an explosive tag, as hard and as precise as he possible could.

Not a moment after the kunai had slipped from his fingers, the ground drew inexplicably nearer. He hit the floor with a hard crash and grunted, frantic fingers tugging at his mask because he could not breath. He tore it down, and the blood gushing from his nose trickled into the floor, but he was able draw in the air, labored and wheezing but it was still good, sustaining air. And he thought: Well, fuck.

 

[Graverobber141]

There was little time for detailed thought, and that fact was considerably irritating, because there were things Satoru needed to sort out before he engaged his sensei in a life-or-death battle: consequences for one, because if this wasn't an elaborate genjutsu, and if he had really been sent back in time, then killing Takeshi now, failing to defend Kakashi, could mean royally fucking up the future. He needed to plan, predict, and all he could do, feeling the wind pause in its pursuit at their heels, hearing the earth lifting behind him, and watching Kakashi take off to engage, was react.

"Fuck," he snarled, the only word that could encompass how much he vehemently hated being put in this position, and how utterly unhelpful that muttered command of his companion's had been: Get the eye.

His body was already moving without explicit direction. Channeling chakra in his feet, he went up the wall instead of around, drawing his chokuto with a wicked slink of metal scrapping against the inside of the leather sheath, and slammed his other hand around the grip of the sword to grasp it in between the seal of the serpent. Wind flowed through him, this jutsu he had inherited from the man on the opposite side of this wall, and moving with a renewed speed, he was at its top in a blink of an eye, peering down to catch what was happening below him.

A paper bomb was exploding, the kunai it was attached to slicing through Takeshi's weapons pouch--there was the clattering sound of metal hitting rock, but it was drowned out a split second later by the shaking boom--and the flames ate hungrily at the wind chakra, climbing and devouring, and for a moment, heart drumming wildly in his chest, eyes widening, Satoru thought--

(not again, not fucking again)

--But Takeshi was far from dead. Skidding up the wall--hair singed, vest scorched, blood dripping down his right arm, and his face and exposed skin burnt nastily--like a revenant, he launched himself off, blade raised to quickly finish off the vulnerable silver-haired man below him.

Satoru was already moving, propelling down, blade meeting blade as his feet landed in front of Kakashi, forcing Takeshi's downward; hardened amber eyes locked with guarded grey ones, and the air whirled to life around the two swordsmen, forceful enough to make the leaves and branches of the trees around the clearing tremble violently.

('Dead,' Takeshi grunted, blade of his chokuto resting against the young boy's throat. Grasping the fabric of his shirt, he pushed the grey-eyed kid into the dirt, skidding his own feet back and snapping his sword into a readied position. 'Patience. Watch me, boy. Closely. Predict, do not react.')

With a jerk of his hand, Takeshi was scraping metal against metal, jerking the two swords up to disengage. They parted, circling the clearing, before they were rushing to meet each other again. It was an elegant dance, precise and timed. Ethereal, in the way their forms flickered at the speed they moved, practically incoherent to the normal eye, how their blades met with enough force to cause sparks, a constant ringing of block and strike.

Seconds turned into minutes, and with his body humming with adrenaline, his mind cleared with one, narrow focus of his current engagement, Satoru lost track of how long this fight lasted, but keeping the chakra flooding his body to merely keep up with his sensei was a strain on his muscles and stamina, and he was starting to slow: an insignificant amount to the normal shinobi, but to one who relied on speed--

Takeshi dodged Satoru's attack, and instead of moving to retaliate, danced backwards to create distant; the gust of forceful wind sent in his direction kept Satoru from immediately pursuing, and he was forced to summon a second gale to rush out to meet it, or risk loosing his footing. While his grip was loosened around his sword to clasp his hands into the serpent, that's when it happened: a sharp tug. The chokuto was pulled from him, the chakra-infused wind carrying the blade to snap into his sensei's waiting hand.

A foreboding chill assaulted Satoru's spine.

Takeshi spared the not-quite-so-new weapon a narrowed glance, brows scrunched together, one Satoru knew as angry confusion, but then he was on the offensive.

The next dance was a lot less graceful. Panicked and desperate, Satoru was dodging, putting footwork to use, summoning up scythes of wind to repel blows that now came from two swords instead of one, and his chakra was draining quickly. His mind was racing for a solution, but he simply didn't have time. Guard broken, a slice to his lower leg sent him tumbling to the ground. Knees digging into earth, he saw the sun glint against the metal of the blade as it came for him.

An eternity in a infinitesimal span of time.

He knew he was going to die. This is how it ended, and he thought--heart in his mouth, a strange absence of fear overwhelming him, an acceptance of this moment--of all the regrets he still had riding his consciousness.

Then he felt a sharp pain, the cool metal of the chokuto pressed against the artery of his neck, digging enough into his skin to draw a line of blood. And Takeshi was staring him down, jaw rigidly set, the other chokuto still held in his free hand.

"Who are you, boy?" The Swordsman of the Sword rumbled in an demand for an answer.

The sword was rather simple, unadorned, without much that separated it from any other of its kind, except for the engraving near its hilt: the symbol of the forgotten Minamoto clan, the chakra-infused blade that made it powerful, unique. How foolish had it been, Satoru thought, gazing up at the man who seemed like a god in this moment, to fight his master with his own blade.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he simply answered, voice barely a whisper.

"You think you're clever?" Takeshi insisted, pushing the sword harder against his neck, forcing another line of blood to drip down sweat-slicked skin.

"Not clever enough." He couldn't help the ironic smile that tugged at his lips, the desperate humor that sunk into the weightless air that tumbled from his mouth.

Amber eyes guarded, the Swordsman stared down at this enigma he had stumbled upon, and with a frustrated grunt, withdrew the blade before infusing it with his chakra, then threw it.

White, searing pain. Gritting his teeth, the chokuto impaled through Satoru's shoulder, striking into the ground, leaving him pinned. Blood seeped into his vest, and he tried to fight through the haze invading his mind, tried to plan.

Takeshi left him there, walking toward Kakashi, shadow cast before him like a giant, moving statue. Reaching the ANBU operative, he kneeled down before him, twisting his sword around in his hand--shuriken flew through the air, and he simply deflected them with his blade, not even throwing a glance at the struggling Satoru--before jerking the young man's head up so he could look upon his face before delivering the final blow--

A blow that did not come. Chokuto stabbing into the ground, Takeshi stared at Kakashi's face, as if he were confirming something within his mind, something unreadable, yet compelling with his amber irises.

"I remember you, Hatake."

 

[arbus]

The sky had cleared.

It was an irony, perhaps, that Kakashi could not see it. Cheek pressed against the half-dried mud, his body was rendered immobile with an ache so deep he did not know what to do with himself. Reality was a pinprick in the very front of his mind, expanding and retracting in sync with the throbbing of Obito's eye. He wondered if his current pain even vaguely resembled what Obito had felt all those long years ago, and hoped it did, because strangely, it eased something within him to be close to his teammate in that way, in what he knew to be his last moments in this world.

He had hoped Ryusuke to be smart enough to run.

He thought about the cold glare of Rin's eyes that was haunting his every dream.

When the shadow fell over him, his finger twitched, brushing against a blade of grass, and he wondered, if he focused, if he could grow desperate enough --

The stench of burnt flesh assaulted his nose as a hand griped his hair, pulled his head up. His vision was impaired; he had trouble focusing on the face before him, eyelids hanging low, and the sharingan was spinning spinning and consuming the last of his energy, relentless in its thirst. He did not understand. Why was he not dead yet?

It took a long moment for the statement to embed itself into his conscious, and another to remember how to form words. His finger twitched again, his lips glued together with his own drying blood. It hurt to open his mouth. The way his head was held strained his neck, pulled at his muscles, and he thought he might pass out from the pain that caused alone.

Kakashi gave off a low, prolonged hum, a guttural sound erupting from his throat. The absence of emotion was a familiar, welcome companion. He wished they would just get it over with.

But --

"I don't know you", he finally managed. His voice sounded congested. He raised his eyes, tomoe spinning lazily. A genjutsu. If he caught the Swordsman's glance, if he mobilized the very last of his strength ... maybe he could return Ryusuke's favor. "Apart from your picture in the bingo book. You look ... somewhat more scorched in real life, though ..."

 

[Graverobber141]

He remembered a silver-haired boy running around a hallway, the crash of a vase, the older man who had spared his life, and the hours spent putting that broken vase back together, his yet too calloused hands holding each shattered piece with care and a gentleness unbeknownst to the warrior who stood over that same, broken boy now.

That now rough hand, laced with scars and burn marks, let go of the mess of silver-hair, letting the head fall back into the soft earth before the genjutsu could take root within his mind, and he simply stayed crouched over him for a long heartbeat, the hard lines of his face cracking just so.

There were questions one might ask into the empty air concerning duty, morality, and righteousness; an internal struggle one might have, a battle of loyalties and debts. But his mind was silent, and his body moved without thought, because he had never been one to linger on such things.

Minamoto Takeshi, known as the Swordsman of the Sand, feared by the five nations, a legend in his own right, gently ran his fingers through that mane of silver-hair, before standing to cast a glance at the other boy with the familiar grey eyes (her eyes, the ghost of a woman he had lost years before her death), who strangely bore his own cursed legacy, and wondered, in some part of his mind, what that meant, but didn't linger on the thought.

There was a slink of metal sliding against leather as he sheathed his chokuto, and without a second glance, he was gone without another word.

The wind lifting from the blade, Satoru found it easier to move, but there was still the matter of the sword impaling him to the ground. Gritting his teeth, wanting to laugh bitterly at how it was the same shoulder the Uchiha had also pierced, he breathed heavily as he struggled to pull a kunai from the pouch on his leg, a lighter. He didn't have time to think about the act of some god keeping Takeshi from murdering the both of them, for he had to keep himself from bleeding out, and then get the both of them the fuck out of here before others showed up.

The kunai was placed between his teeth and he bit down hard. Summoning up wind in his left hand, he used the lighter to spark fire in palm, keeping the flames dancing around his fingers, as his right gripped the sword wedged inside his shoulder.

He inhaled deeply and pulled.

A pained growl ripped through his throat as he freed the bloodied blade, letting it crash into the ground, and that growl turned into a muffled scream as he pressed the fire into the wound, searing the flesh shut with an involuntarily jerk of his leg. All he could feel was white hot pain, searing and vivid.

Panting, jaw slacking, the kunai began to slip from his mouth, and he could taste the blood from where he had cut his lip.

Next came the leg.

After all the cauterizations, he fell onto his side, chest heaving from effort, and forced himself to stand. Sheathing his chokuto, he stumbled over to Kakashi, reached out to sling the ANBU's arm over his shoulder, muttering, "We have to move."

 

[arbus]

Confusion swept over Kakashi; it would have been more heartfelt, however, if his body was not hurting as if he had decided to bathe it in simmering oil. His face was buried in the soft earth, so he had to shift his head, breath through his mouth. Blackness like sweet oblivion tugged at him, and he was tempted to shut his eyes and let the earth open up beneath him and swallow him whole. He could have sworn Minamoto Takeshi had stroked his head, and for kami's sake, maybe he was delirious to have imagined such a thing.

Impotent, he listened to Ryusuke's muffled cries. The smell of a cauterized wound was noticeably different from burnt flesh; clotted blood and tissue gave it a spicy, almost sweet note, settling into the back of one's throat, so sickeningly familiar to an ANBU operative that instead of stirring threat, it evoked a sense of calm, of serenity gained after a battle survived.

His fingers dug into the earth and dirt. He was so frustratingly useless, should have been smarter and faster; luck, plain and dumb, had been on their side; the whim of a man known to be merciless in his executions had saved their lives. A riddle Kakashi would examine later. Now, all he could do as Ryusuke was pulling him to his feet was to lock the pained noises emitting from his throat behind gritted teeth. The man was right; they had to get away from the clearing. Kakashi doubted that, after the Swordsman's inexplicable retreat, the Sand shinobi would continue their chase. But it was impossible to say for certain; he was not familiar with their chain of command, and it was just as likely for another squad to scan the perimeter for their bodies.

He lifted his face, boyishly young, straight nose and pointed chin all caked with mud, and blinked against the tunnel-vision. Moving into a standing position had heightened the throb in his skull to a pain like a blade piercing his temples in a lazy rhythm, and a fresh gush of blood streamed from his nose. He was muddied, bloodied, and had a hundred things on the tip of his tongue, but what he actually said was: "Heard the ... onsen 'spposed to be nice this time of year."

The Land of Hot Water was known for its neutrality and hot springs alike. The land's sparse population consisted mostly of civilians. While a shinobi village existed, it lay far from their current position. In the north-east, were impressive mountain ranges indicated the border to the Land of Frost, they would find unaffiliated, natural onsen. It was the next best thing to a hospital bed and a concoction of chakra restoring medicine, and as it happened, it lay in the direction of their mission's objective.

Hot Water was a small land, the distances much shorter than in Fire; Kakashi slowed them down, however, body slumped heavily against Ryusuke's frame. He fell in and out of consciousness the whole way, feet dragging behind him before he pulled himself back and his body tensed to carry its own weight, only to slip off again minutes later. Mercifully, they reached the overgrown barrows of the natural hot springs without another enemy encounter; the area was secluded enough for shelter, the air thick with the steam of an onsen embedded in the ground. Uninhabited because of its impassibility and distance to the next civilian hamlet, they could have done way worse, and with a bit of craftsmanship and shrewdness would be able to pamper themselves up before continuing to move.

 

[Graverobber141]

Slow was an understatement. Struggling to keep himself standing, Satoru's wounded leg constantly wanted to buckle underneath him, the loss of blood and exertion left his mind hazing toward blackness a few times, and there was once or twice where he dropped the both of them. Had they been attacked, he wouldn't have been able to defend them, not in his condition, and he wondered if that was some second act of the universe in their favor, sheer, undeserved luck, or Takeshi's doing, perhaps a combination.

Reaching the secluded area, smelling a nearby onsen, a welcome change from the overwhelming stench of his own cauterized flesh, the swordsman carefully leaned Kakashi against an overhanging tree, before falling back into the soft grass. Breathing stuttering and rampant, his grey eyes scanned the blue sky above them, the sun whose rays danced across the leaves that tousled in the light breeze, and he found himself laughing at the sudden change of it all.

Lying there, having almost died, spared by nothing more than chance, Satoru brushed back his dark hair, exhaustion, emotional and physical, overwhelming him, and he couldn't stop chuckling; a bitter, shaky, flippant sound that all but challengingly cursed their circumstances, asking the world, 'come on, is that all you've got?'

"Well, fuck," he was finally able to muttered, once more finding that word the only way to express his thoughts on the situation.

Pushing himself up into a sitting position with a grimace, part of his mind registered that he needed to bandage himself up to help stave off infection, make sure Kakashi wasn't wounded, build a shelter, figure out some way to start tracking down his Uchiha (strange, this worry edging at the back of his conscious at the knowledge Sasuke had been left on the verge of a breakdown in the middle of a combat zone), and build some sort of defensive perimeter. Just thinking about it all made the tiredness seeping into his muscles all the more potent, and with a sigh, he turned his gaze onto his companion, cocking a brow as he asked, "Any permanent damage?"

 

[arbus]

Amusement, or some sort of wickedly dry humor, pulled one corner of Kakashi's mouth into a lop-sided smile. He certainly understood the sentiment. Fuck indeed. In his books, they could consider themselves lucky; if the rest of the team was alright as well, if they continued to carry out the mission, he'd count it as an all-round success. His eyes remained closed, his arms limp at his sides, head tilted back to soak in the sunlight falling through the trees.

It as a relief, not to be dragged across half of the country anymore. And while his body pulsed and ached, he had survived once more, and now was the time to recuperate, plan, move forward to his next objective. He had the man next to him thank for that; without him blocking the way, Takeshi would have executed his first strike, the counter-attack after Kakashi's explosive tag had left him a bit burnt around the edges. And he would have certainly not made it all the way here, but would still be lying in the mud in a clearing somewhere in the depths of an unknown forest.

"Apart from my pride", he drawled in a lazy voice, ultimately unconcerned about anything but the fact that they had both made it, "none. You?" It remained to be seen if his chakra pathways forgave his over-exhaustion once again, but usually they did, and while it took some time for his body to recover to full potential, it had never been a problem before. "Ryusuke, hm?" The sun was a comfort on his cool skin. "What kind of name is that?"