"I don't know." Naruto's voice was contemplative. Aiko didn't bother to look, but she knew that he'd be screwing his face up. That was what he did when his voice was like that. "This seems like a bad idea. The Daimyo have rules about their nobles visiting capitals for a reason."
Aiko kicked her heels against the side of the building. From her perch, the evening wind was sending spikes of cold against her flesh, raising goosebumps against her flesh wherever it hit. "It's not that bad. Money's good. Not even killing anyone."
What did she care if the Cloud Daimyo demanded his advisors send their wives to live with him for the length of appointments? Okay, having live-in hostages did ensure excellent behavior and keep workers on task. But it wasn't her problem.
"Who are you talking to?"
Her conscience, duhhhh.
'He is a good bodyguard. Nice and forgettable.'
"No one," Aiko snapped. Aiko rolled her shoulder, joints creaking unpleasantly as she came back to the real world. 'Maybe it's time to go in.'
She stood and stretched without making eye contact with her impromptu partner. She pushed past him, letting her bored, disdainful expression speak for itself.
Haru furrowed his brow and craned his head to be absolutely certain that there was no one else around before he followed Aiko inside.
Aiko heard the intentional scuff and tap of his footsteps behind her, sounds as steady as heartbeat. He sounded like a perfectly capable civilian-type retainer and personal bodyguard. Without knowing, she probably wouldn't have picked him out as some C-list missing nin hastily hired so that no scrupulously honest retainer would have a chance to notice that something was different about the lady of the house lately. Aiko sighed, reluctantly impressed with his commitment to his role. It wasn't like she was trying very hard.
That in mind, she adjusted her posture to adapt the feminine, shuffling walk that made a woman in kimono look as though she was floating. Since her henge faithfully reproduced the expressions of her real face underneath, Aiko schooled her face as well.
'Boring.'
The real noblewoman was living in her husband's retinue under disguise as a maidservant. They thought it was terribly clever and daring. Aiko fully expected that romantic notion to fail in an ugly fashion when the realities of manual labor set in, or when someone inevitably noticed the switch.
But in the meantime, it wasn't so bad to be paid handfuls of ryo to wear beautiful clothes, order around a household, and lounge. Going to parties sucked, but it was a mission. It couldn't be all fun and sitting alone in the dark.
The mission had been a lucky break. It was the kind of thing that the client wouldn't have wanted to take to an official shinobi mission desk: all governments had to at least give face service to respecting each others' institutions. It was one thing to infight with other shinobi nations, but Daimyo were a system unto themselves. At least theoretically, shinobi owed Daimyo allegiance. Risking that relationship just wasn't worth it.
Missing nin, not so much. They couldn't possibly be any more politically incorrect.
'It takes so long to get anywhere walking like this.'
Despite her frustration, Aiko steeled herself to match her pace to the calm rhythm of Haru's breathing. They went down stairs and passed into the less public areas of the palace.
Haru made a small, surprised sound, and then a rattling inhalation.
Aiko flung her body to the side before she tried to look. The movement barely got her out of another shinobi's lunging attack path. The hunter-nin had already adjusted, breathing out licks of fire.
For just one second, Aiko took in the scene. Haru's knees buckled and his ponytail was streaming behind him as he fell, surprise forever plastered on his features. One Mist hunter-nin was behind him- the other's jutsu was roaring across the last few inches of distance.
She was gone before she consciously thought that she should move.
Well, fuck that job. It clearly wasn't worth the pay, if- if-
Mist hunter nin were involved? Without paying any notice to the squirrel that chattered in surprise and darted out of a broken window, Aiko sank down to sit.
'Mist hunter nin wouldn't care about some official's wife. They were there for a shinobi- me, or Haru.'
She didn't know shit about who Haru really was. Maybe he was a Mist nuke-nin, although she'd honestly guessed he was from Iwa.
'But I do know that I startled the Mizukage, and he may be under the impression that I got past all his security and tried to kill him.'
"Oops," Aiko said despondently. The empty hideout she'd traveled to on reflex did not answer, though curtains rustled in the wind. She sighed, pushing herself up to stand. She took a quick look around the room- that window had clearly broken at least a week back, and nature was attempting to move in- and rolled her eyes.
At least some things could be relied upon. Obito was still a pig.
It probably wasn't a good idea- he would know that someone had been here, and probably freak the fuck out- but Aiko found it soothing to rummage up the tools to patch the hole with sturdy cloth over the whole window. It wasn't professional quality, but it'd keep leaves and rain out. Maybe not the squirrels though.
'Whatever. I have bigger problems than squirrels.'
Cranky, Aiko tossed the hammer over her shoulder, suddenly done with distracting herself. She did not investigate the ominous clattering sounds that resulted.
'I'm probably being tracked. Nuts or not, the Mizukage would probably make the pursuit of a supposed assassin a high priority. He'd be concerned about stopping the security holes that let me in and preventing embarrassment, if nothing else.'
Just bloody typical. She was in trouble for something she didn't actually do. With all the shit that she actually pulled, it was fucking offensive that she was getting bothered for minding her own business.
Hiraishin was probably the only reason they hadn't caught up to her before. It was pretty fucking hard to track someone who could travel instantaneously. They must have either been really lucky or ferociously determined to find her at all.
'Then how did they find me this time?' She stopped to consider the situation, brow furrowed. 'They'd circulate my description, probably hit on the same hotspots that I know of to find unsanctioned missions….'
"Son of a bitch," Aiko cursed under her breath. "Someone sold me out!"
Only explanation. Either Haru- and if he had, Mist hadn't kept up their end of that deal- or the broker who had hooked her up with the contract. Or someone else working in that household could have recognized her and sold her out. That seemed unlikely, but she couldn't dismiss it entirely.
'This isn't going to go away without a damn good reason.'
Like… A new Mizukage, for example? Killing the current Mizukage and leaving Kiri with bigger problems to worry about? Or just unacceptable losses to personnel that prompted the administration to back off?
The little Naruto-ish part of her consciousness tapped a foot against the floor.
"One of these things is not like the other," he pointed out waspishly. "We should find Mei-nee-chan and help her out, then."
Aiko shook her head to dismiss the input. "No. No way. Mei was in the Mizukage's personal guard squad, playing off the loyalists and the rebels. I can't access her."
But she definitely could go kill some Mist-nin.
Naruto would find a way to do this peacefully, make the opportunity himself if he had to. But Aiko cracked her neck, stripped off the far-too-fancy kimono she was wearing, and went back to the capital city in the gear she'd had under the dress.
She'd sell the kimono there. If the Mist hunter-nin were worth anything at all, they'd track her down again and follow her to attempt to finish her again. They'd think she was still in the area somehow- anything else was just too unbelievable.
Sure enough, Aiko picked up a tail not long after leaving the pawn shop. She wasn't surprised: the owner had haggled nervously and stalled long enough that he almost had to have been tipped off.
They didn't attack her on the streets.
That wasn't so strange. They were operating in a foreign nation.
They didn't attack her when she stopped for the night at an inn on the outskirts of town. Her personal shadows stayed far back enough that it was completely plausible that they thought she didn't know they were there.
That restraint was a little odd, but understandable. It made sense to wait until she was totally alone, if they were more cautious than eager.
When no one made a move after Aiko had been out of civilization for four hours, she had to admit that something else was going on.
'New orders?' She wondered, working down the itch of tension in her shoulders. Even under the security seals and traps and genjutsu that she set up at night, she wasn't getting much rest under constant watch. 'Maybe they're just here to observe for now. They've probably figured out that if they show their faces, I slip away. So they're just watching, staying quiet so that they don't scare me off. '
Not like that was a good thing. That was situational analysis- they wanted to figure out who she was and how she kept slipping away.
'They're probably waiting for backup.'
Or…
On a hunch, Aiko altered her path after she stopped for lunch. She'd left the city on the most obvious route, headed towards the next large settlement. It had been what she would have done, if she had really been a rogue nin desperate to make some money and get what resources they had after a mission gone wrong.
(Some part of her mind laughed until it cried because hell, how was that not what she really was, the only difference was that geographical restraints about seeking necessary shelter and supplies and work didn't apply)
The Mist hunter-nin scattered, falling far enough behind that she actually couldn't sense them. And then they came back at her from another direction, angry sparks of killing intent heralding an all but literal flight.
'Oh shit.'
It was actually pretty intimidating. Powerful. Almost familiar. But that was nuts, how many Kiri nin would Aiko recognize by chakra?
There was really only one thing to do: turn to the course they wanted her to take. Aiko turned and started running in the direction they were herding her. Her pumping heartbeat and nerves were loudly suggesting that she sprint, but her head knew better. No, she needed a pace she could keep up for a long time. A day or more, if she had to, and then still be capable of putting up a fight.
'Sometimes, I hate being right.'
Two pursuants, and they were probably the ones she'd encountered before. Aiko tried to remember the brief glimpse she'd gotten- both were slim, but one was so small that they had to be a child or a petite woman. The other was unremarkable, she thought.
'They're trying to force me into a trap,' she diagnosed. 'They almost certainly have backup. Or maybe just a situation heavily weighed in their favor. Tiring me out couldn't hurt, either. Why am I doing what they want?'
Aiko wavered with indecision. It was a bad idea to go ahead with this. She didn't know what they had planned, but she knew the goal was not to her benefit.
'I'm not immortal.'
She shivered, stumbling when her foot landed oddly in an indented rock she hadn't noticed. But she didn't stop running.
'They really could kill me if I stay. Why act how they expect? I can just up and leave.'
But then she wouldn't know what she was up against at all. Their next move would be a genuine surprise. If they'd gone for her first instead of Haru, she'd be dead right now.
That was chilling. She hadn't considered it much, but- she hadn't heard them, had she? Or smelled them or seen them or-
'They're really good. That's the kind of silent killing that Mist is actually famous for. I've never dealt with that before.'
Aiko clenched her jaw.
'I don't think I can afford to let them catch me unawares again. This team has to die, for sure.'
When they were sure she was on track, the Mist team pretended to lose ground. They fell back, chakra fading. The rate was gradual but sure, a trick to keep her moving but feel safe enough to at least consider that she had outpaced her pursuers.
'Do they seriously think I'm stupid?'
Well. To be fair, if she was panicking, desperation and hope might prompt her to hope she'd really lost them.
She couldn't sense them at all. They could be staying further behind. They could just be really, really good at keeping a low profile.
Either way, she did not stop running. Her feet ached and her chest hurt and her breath was coming in gasps despite her restraint but she did not stop running. Pain began to shoot up her knees with every step throughout the night- She must have twisted her ankle without knowing, blinded by adrenaline.
The air turned cold. The moon was out. And that was when a familiar well of chakra roared to life a few miles from her position. It was nearly ahead- a bit south and east of her position, but too close to ignore-
And-
And she didn't really have much choice but to drop the game and use a burst of Hiraishin speed to cover the last of the difference, because if the Mist-nin thought they could somehow get two missing nin at once, she either had to leave entirely or assist Utakata before she got pinned against a hostile, irrational jinchuuriki with hunter-nin sandwiching them in.
A deep, distant part of her was reluctantly impressed with that bit of ingenuity. Stressing and pissing off two powerful opponents, knocking them together, and then being there to wipe up the winner was a labor-efficient plan.
And crap on a cracker, the Mist nin had accidentally hit on a tactic to create a situation she was unwilling to desert. Utakata would be killed if he was dragged back to Mist. Was Obito already in Kiri? She couldn't leave. It'd be delivering him a bijuu. That'd be losing. She didn't lose, not even when no one else knew they were in opposition.
Utakata was already half-bijuu, leaking poison and sharp bits of shells and screaming a clawed strike through the air.
Somehow, the one hunter nin she could see managed to look surprised even behind their mask. The moment spent gaping at her sudden appearance cost him- a thin, whiplike tail snared his ankle. He screamed, but only for a moment. Utakata bellowed a stream of green-tinged bubbles at the hunter-nin. They melted his mask to his face with a horrible hissing sound and the smell of cooking meat.
Her stomach jolted.
The hunter nin went down with a strangled scream, fingers scrabbling at the molten porcelain before falling into throes of convulsion.
'Why did I think Utakata was a delicate flower again?'
She hit the ground, more instincts than person. Utakata tore through the earth behind her, great strains of chakra sludging together into something that was more of a cudgel than a whip.
"I'm not an enemy!"
Aiko flipped backwards, trying to find something human in Utakata. His pupils were blown wide open, and his lips curled up in a snarl.
'This is why they provoked him. He'll attack anyone who gets close by, exhaust himself, and then be easy to pick off.'
She really should just leave. Utakata had survived this before, probably. Or situations like it. Maybe not ones quite that bad. He'd… he'd figure it out. She couldn't see how he could escape this. It was probably her fault he was in this situation.
Her brain told her to cut her losses. Her tired body made an alternate suggestion, chakra moving to form chains before she'd consciously had the thought.
'Secure him. Make him stop. The less time he's like this, the less damage to his body. I have minutes before the other hunter-nin get here. I need to make it count. If they didn't want to fight either of us, I could probably take them by myself if I need to. I can't afford to be watching fighting Utakata at the same time.'
She caught the largest tail manifestation, but it slipped away, re-manifesting outside of her grip and she groaned. There was roaring and crashing in her ears and the sound of chains clanking, heat pressing her skin and burns welling up and Utakata was a blur of dodging and striking and hell, if he would just stop moving she could-
Latch a chain around his body. Aiko winced when the restraint connected, whipping around Utakata's torso to wind all the way around. But she didn't pull back, even when she heard the unmistakable sound of a rib cracking under too-much-pressure, she really needed to practice with chakra chains more often.
She had him down. She forced him away from her and his chakra levels were sinking, forced to recede from contact with her chains but she was working open the straps on her kunai pouch to snag out her kunai. Now that they wouldn't be destroyed by demonic chakra, she hastily flung three kunai around her so that blades sunk into the dirt, leaving her in the center of a highly maneuverable field.
'Using Hiraishin like this is too obvious. Someone might make the association, given time and luck.'
But she didn't have a choice. She was tired enough that she needed the advantage.
Well. Those hunter nin definitely had to die.
Utakata slumped in his bonds, nearly human again. The faint but hidden signatures of her followers were coming out, probably alarmed and confused by how quickly the demonic chakra had receded.
Aiko waited in her Hiraishin field, with the one kunai she had left clenched so tightly in her hand that it cramped.
"You back with me yet?" she asked Utakata, not really expecting a response.
He made an odd, rasping sound. She realized a moment later that it was the sound of a bloody throat being cleared. "I had six," Utakata said, and it might have been helpful or it might have been bragging.
"I think I only had two," Aiko admitted, feeling the stupidest twinge of jealousy that Utakata was considered to be so much more dangerous than she was.
What did dumb old Kiri know anyway.
Well. He was already struggling to his feet, with mussed hair and singed clothes. That was intimidating.
She took a moment to weigh the risks and benefits of letting him get up instead of hitting him while he was down. He was not insensible or evil: Utakata was someone she could work with. On the other hand, he was a sensible missing nin. He wouldn't trust her.
Well. Had to make a call.
"How fit are you?" Aiko asked, feeling her heartbeat pick up a nervous drumbeat. "I don't think I can take eight hunter-nin. I'm close distance."
'I can always leave. The chances that Obito will be at any particular safehouse are minimal. I can go to one of those if it gets grim.'
"Seven now," Utakata pointed out in a voice that was still wrecked by shallow breathing and a warped throat. "I don't trust myself to use my special chakra right now. Long distance."
So his abilities were severely compromised.
'Good. Makes it less likely that he'll feel comfortable attacking me afterward.'
"Anything to even the odds?" Aiko asked, very much missing her kit. "This is literally all I have." She held up the one kunai in her hand. "My chakra is good, but physically I'm hitting a wall." Admitting that stung, but denying it would be stupid. They were going into a disadvantageous situation together. Lying could get them killed.
Utakata glanced at the weapon, and then his eyes darted to the three in the dirt. He didn't comment. "I have a fast-acting paralytic, but I can't distribute it without risking reverting back at the moment."
'Hello!'
Aiko perked up at that. "How fast is fast?" She started walking, not eager to stay too close to the crumpled body and heavy scent of acid. The hairs in her nostrils were starting to singe from the vapors.
"A minute of exposure time will dull reflexes and perception; another minute will all but immobilize anyone who comes into contact." Utakata's forehead was creased, but his panting was beginning to slow. "An increased heartbeat and movement will accelerate the effects. Perhaps we will notice results in forty seconds. It's my own blend."
She waved off that warning. "I know," Aiko acknowledged. "But I'm fast. Block me from exposure for even a couple seconds. I can use the gap between when they go and when I go."
Aiko planted her feet shoulder-width, closed her eyes, and reached into her coils for the chakra that came most naturally to her. Water. She opened her mouth and forced it out, pushing and pushing a spout of water that splashed over her feet and gouged against the peat. Clearly catching on, Utakata tapped his little bubble pipe twice and blew through it. A sickly yellow material gooped out the end, plopping in the decent sized pool of water that Aiko was still working on.
'So it's the bijuu who allows him to make the bubbles?' Aiko theorized. 'He actually has the different materials in the pipe and releases them by pushing different parts of the thing.'
"Wait until the last second," Utakata counseled, his dark gaze already narrowing on the direction he had been running from. And then he… began taking off his kimono?
"Now is not the time!" Aiko hissed, confused and upset and just a little turned on.
The look he shot her was absolutely withering. He slipped off the outer layer entirely, revealing that he had a loose white robe on underneath.
"This is water resistant," Utakata said stiffly. "It should give you a few seconds advantage."
Oh. Right. Aiko pulled the thing on hastily. He'd said to wait, but they only had seconds, so she gritted her teeth, gripped all the tainted water, and forced it into the atmosphere. The air instantly hung heavy.
She was planning on making more of a fog than a precursor to rain, to be honest. The fog could be an attempt to obscure vision.
Something moved. Aiko jerked her gaze down, registered, 'Oh, it's just the fog coming up,' and went back to her jutsu before she realized something.
It wasn't her fog.
In sheer surprise, she let her hold on the water slip. Yes, it definitely wasn't her fog.
'They had the same strategy we did. Well. The same tool, anyway.'
Aiko took a moment to exchange an incredulous glance with Utakata, who looked like he might be
stifling a startled laugh.
It really wasn't funny. That technique probably meant that the Kiri nin were more than prepared to fight without visibility.
The fog that the Kiri-hunter nin were bringing up from groundwater puffed up to hip height in the instant before the first masked figure darted into view.
They faltered, jerking for a fraction of an instant at visual confirmation. Probably surprised that Aiko was standing with Utakata.
But the nin decisively moved for Utakata.
The last of the fog closed up above Aiko's head, obscuring everything more than three feet away.
Aiko bared her teeth and darted forward. Utakata was swaying, but clearly ready to engage in taijutsu. She got between the two as the hunter-nin brought down a naked blade in an overhead move that would be difficult to block.
'They thought I'd be dead. Their strategy was just for Utakata.'
Insulting, but it did present opportunity. Their strategy would be geared towards taking down Utakata, not the two of them working in tandem.
Sparks flew. Aiko grunted, straining with the effort of holding her kunai against the middle of the mid-length blade. She registered that it was a double sided blade.
It had been aimed to cut down Utakata, who was taller than Aiko. Her arms were almost entirely outstretched, directly above her head.
Muscles trembled. She would have been making eye contact if she could see anything through the shadows cast by the ghostly white mask. Her jaw clenched.
The hunter-nin disengaged, sword rearing up and then whipping around as he swiveled, bringing the blade around to his left. Aiko let her knees buckle and her haunches hit her heels. The lightning-fast sideways swipe bit through her trailing ponytail. She rolled forward, coming to her feet behind him. She was going to turn, to cut at him before he could turn around-
Aiko sprang up, over the low swept kick from a second hunter-nin. With her feet off the ground she twisted, eyes wide at the incoming blow from hunter-nin number three.
'This sucks.'
She didn't recognize the weapon. Some kind of spear running wet with droplets of water. She couldn't dodge it.
The world shifted. She sprang away from the exact center of her three kunai. She zeroed in on the nin with their backs facing her.
Her kunai was out, destined to slip under the place between neck and skull. The nin was turning, but not fast enough.
And then Aiko wheezed, sent stumbling sideways by a hard-packed doton jutsu the size of an orange. Her ribs creaked where the blow had connected. She caught a glimpse of her attacker, barely visible through the mist.
She heard Utakata curse, and the sound of metal connecting, but she couldn't go to help him.
"The dance floor is pretty full!" Aiko shouted, strain and pain pitching her voice higher.
No one responded. She didn't know what she'd been expecting.
The nin with the doton had backed off, moved out of sight.
'A defensive fighter. No, not exactly. A protective fighter. More like a bodyguard than anything else.'
Aiko huffed and made a tactical retreat away from where she thought the hunter-nin were. She sunk her chakra back into the pooled water, forcing it to dissipate up and replace the other fog. Aiko waited with her heart in her throat, counting off seconds until the crucial moment of Utakata's time estimate.
There were splashes in the distance. Five seconds. Grunting through the fog. Ten seconds.
There was a whisper of steel cutting air. Aiko whipped to the left, already trying to predict the second, third, and fourth shuriken that came on the first weapon's heels. She didn't hear the fifth winging behind the fourth, but she felt it tear through the muscles of her shoulder. The blade kept spinning for part of a rotation, the initial spike squelching out of her flesh and the next digging in only halfway. Its bite was lessened by the loss of momentum but oh hell, it hurt both times it cut. Aiko choked, flinching with the sudden ringing in her ears. She kept moving to evade the subsequent projectiles, but she didn't even register how many there were.
The shuriken that hit her was flopping, tugging and nearly falling out of her flesh but not coming out.
Bile rose. She was hyper sensitive to every movement of the steel in her skin.
It felt like a hallucination, streaks of light glinting off metal and shadows moving through fog heavy water that weighed down her clothes and hair and-
'The moisture got through Utakata's clothes already,' Aiko realized. She pulled out the shuriken. She held it between the knuckles of her free hand, since she couldn't turn down a weapon.
Twenty seconds since she'd poisoned the fog. The time she had between when her muscles would fail and when the kiri-nin would flag was somewhere between ten and twenty seconds.
'I need to find whoever is throwing this shit.'
It wasn't hard to find the general direction- the gouge in her arm pointed back to its origin. Aiko crossed the distance in a second, breathing deep and trying to catch a scent or hear breathing or-
The scuff of a foot. Aiko took the distance at a leap, leading with a two-footed kick and hoping to connect or at least land easily in the poor visibility. She made contact, sandals plowing into a flat chest. She rode the thrower to the ground, bending forward to cut out their throat. She half expected them to be fast enough to block- most of the team had been.
This hunter-nin wasn't. Her blade opened up an unprotected neck. Heat splattered up her forearms and shins. She was pretty sure it was the small hunter-nin that had been following her before.
Aiko leapt off, flicking her blade clean as she went. She moved away from her kill, aware that the Mist-nin were tracking through the mist somehow.
Six hunter-nin left. Twenty five seconds down.
She turned her ear in the direction of a gurgling breath. A body hit the ground. Aiko held her breath and hastily worked the stretchy headband off her scalp, pulling it up her arm and twisting it to serve as a rough sort of compress. She didn't hear anyone get up.
Five hunter-nin left? Maybe?
No. Confirm all kills. Don't assume. Aiko tracked back the sound and nearly stumbled over a kiri-nin. Her mask had fallen off and she was clutching at her chest, struggling for breath. Blood and spit were trailing down her tan face.
Aiko grimaced. Her chest armor was collapsed inward from a blow. The body underneath it had to be dying. Slowly.
The Kiri nin was a bit preoccupied, thin lips working in silent words and eyes creased shut. She didn't notice Aiko. It was a mercy kill.
Thirty seconds down.
A scream of rage cut the air. Aiko's neck prickled in premonition. A gust of wind tore across the plateau, pushing open the fog. The hunter who'd summoned it was crouched over the body of the long distance specialist.
Was it the doton user? Looked like.
'Must be his partner,' Aiko thought in the moment before the mist normalized again. She didn't have time for another thought, because the nin was bearing down. Aiko darted to the side, and pushed away a punch.
The air was suddenly stiflingly hot. The mist nin leapt up, poised for something. The lizard part of Aiko's brain recognized it. She moved.
Aiko had gone back to her kunai before she understood why. She'd moved before she knew who she was facing.
She couldn't see the result of that last jutsu, but the area was much, much hotter, and the air was sizzling.
'That nin used fire jutsu yesterday. Earth earlier. Wind to move the fog, and something hot again just now,' Aiko catalogued numbly. 'That's a lot of elemental proficiency for one person.'
All the pieces were there. But she didn't want to cope with the fact that she was facing down Mei. The hunter-nin looked like a man in that unisex armor. What was Mei doing so far from Kiri?
'Well. Hunter-nin are the elite. Not a bad place for a kage to come from.'
This was ridiculous. Mei belonged in Kirigakure. She should go back to Kirigakure. Aiko was going to file a complaint.
'What do I do?'
Kill Mei in order to keep Utakata and herself safe?
Refuse to fight Mei and instead abandon Utakata to die alone?
Leave Mei alive, to remember Aiko far too early?
The options and considerations were all bad. Utakata wouldn't let her spare Mei. He would fight until all the hunter-nin were dead or until he was. But she wanted both Mei and Utakata alive.
'She's got to go.'
Mei came barreling toward her again, infuriated but collected enough not to spew lava blindly. This time, Aiko dropped into an athletic stance, tucked away her kunai, and let the shuriken hit the floor. She leapt forward to slap the future Mizukage open-palmed on her clothed thigh and twist away. The sting probably disguised the seal Aiko planted, but she didn't wait to see. Mei was straightening, turning to come flying at Aiko again.
Aiko inhaled sharply and hiraishin'd twice, clutching blindly at Mei's hip in the space between travels. This time Mei reacted fast enough for a blow to connect. Aiko couldn't see what had happened but suddenly she was flying backwards and holy hell her torso was going to be one big bruise tomorrow. She hit a coral outcropping with her side and rolled, body twisting to make some semblance of a landing despite the fact that she couldn't breathe and her body was stinging pain down to her elbows and fingertips and bursting cold hurt against her ribs.
Somehow, Aiko landed on top of the water. Mei fell in with a surprised splash. The hunter-nin burst out in an explosion of steam, but Aiko was already gone.
'Time to never think about how I may have just fucked up the future.'
She shook her head to clear it. Aiko stifled a hysterical giggle and took stock of the situation. The…
The mist was falling. Of course it was. She'd left and lost control of it. It was seeping down and dissipating, only obscuring about five feet above the ground and sinking fast.
Her kunai was in her hand before she thought to grab for it. But that was strange- her fingers were clumsy. They felt numb against the metal.
'I stopped counting,' Aiko realized. 'It must be past forty seconds. Poisons often affect extremities first.'
The mist was thinner. She could see shapes as far as six feet away- and they could see her too. Someone leapt at her. Thinking of moving as little as possible to keep her heartrate down, Aiko pulled away with Hiraishin.
She didn't move too far- the nin followed. She snapped away again, stopping in between her poor abandoned kunai this time.
The hunter-nin stepped in her triangle of discarded kunai, a chokuto flashing so fast that Aiko couldn't actually track the movement. She could see that the movement jerked and faltered. The sword flew out of the kiri elite's grip.
'Embarrassing.'
They might have been staring in disbelief. Aiko didn't stop to check, concentrating much more than she normally would to whip her kunai out.
It flew straight but not true: instead of sinking into the dip between the clavicle, it fell to the left side of the chest.
It must have scraped the bone. It was so close to an instant kill shot. But it wasn't. The svelte mist-nin clutched at the weapon and ripped it out. It clattered against rocks and spun to skid into a puddle.
'Bad move. He might have lived if he'd left it in until he got a medic. Not that I was going to let that happen, but still. Ouch.'
Aiko winced in sympathy but still tracked the way that her sole weapon fell.
'Maybe that's better. He'll bleed out faster without that stopping it up.'
She should kill the Kiri nin herself, just to be sure. She should. She was tired. She went after her weapon. She felt slow and sluggish. There was a pressure, like a hand pushing at her chest. No, not a whole hand. Two fingers pressing against the place where she had tried to hit the mist nin, or maybe a little lower. Breathing was hard.
Aiko felt her knees tremble.
The mist was down to her hips at that point. Her vision was blurry, but she could see enough. The hunter-nin who had been so proficient at the start of the fight were slowing and becoming clumsy. They were moving like genin, not elites of the most vicious military culture in the continent.
Utakata took the remaining three nin down in less than ten seconds.
Aiko rested her face in her hands.
Sandals squished softly against vegetation and sodden ground when he turned to observe her. He didn't say anything.
"Do you keep andi-antidotes?" Aiko asked, rolling her clumsy tongue around her mouth. She blinked. Her eyes were heavy. So were her limbs.
A sigh. "I suppose."
She had enough presence of mind to crack her eye open and flinch away from the syringe Utakata presented to her. She was on her knees. When had that happened? She let him administer the shot. It didn't help that much. Her hands stopped twitching and shaking, but she was still tired and dizzy.
"Lack of sleep and bloodloss," Utakata diagnosed. He sounded bored.
Oh. Right. She should wash out her wound and get liquids. Aiko peeled open her eye to check. Her entire arm was covered in blood, as was a good deal of the left side of her torso.
It could wait. She had lingering curiosity to satisfy about the nin who had been Mei's partner. As she walked she felt a bit steadier. It was a little tricky to find the body in the fog. All she could see of most of the bodies were feet, smooth white masks, and maybe a bit of chest or oddly bent legs. The rest was still sunk in white twirls of liquid poison.
The mask of that first kill was a clever thing, held to the head with laces of clear string and a weighted curve. Her hand shook when she lifted it, taking care not to let any hooks catch on sweat-tangled hair or one bloody ear. Blue lips, blue hair. Dark grey eyes that were glazing over. The boy was maybe thirteen.
Sometimes, she really hated being right.
Aiko sat back on her heels and contemplated the little corpse in such meaningful uniform. Black ops clothing really shouldn't come sized for children.
'The hems are long so it can be let out. This… this is going to be a lot closer to my proportions than any of the other uniforms.'
She licked the inside of her teeth, feeling the holes between the bits of white bone.
"Are you done?" Utakata's irritation lifted over the distance between them.
She sighed. "Back off." She pushed the child's face to the side so that she didn't have to see it before continuing to strip the body. She felt slow, and her arms shook from some of the effort. But she got it done alone.
Utakata made a sound of disgust, but didn't interfere.
"An outfit like this should be in everyone's closet," Aiko lilted, keeping the seriousness she felt out of her voice. "There's one in your size over there."
It took far too much energy to banter. She needed to get somewhere safe and crash.
"No, but thank you for the offer." Utakata sounded like he was examining his nails. "Not that this hasn't been enjoyable, but I should really be going."
Fair enough.
Aiko set the mask on the rest of the gear and rolled the fabric up. She tucked the sad little bundle under her arm. The poison had probably been neutralized at that point. "You set up for the night?" she asked tonelessly.
"There are probably more of them around here."
She hoped not. But counting on that would be a bad idea.
The jinchuuriki scoffed. "Of course." His crisp, rude tone was somewhat undermined by the sound of rustling fabric that came a moment later. Fidgeting? "Are you going to take care of the bodies?"
Somewhere in that prodding question was an offer.
Aiko shot him a look that as more tired gratitude than a smile. "I'd better do it myself. I've done a lot of this."
Utakata backed down immediately, picking up on her implication that she'd had Black Ops training. He stood back and observed without comment as she took care of the mess. The audience was uncomfortable, but Aiko stoically bore through it. She didn't have much choice- it would be preferable if Kiri didn't get an opportunity to examine the bodies to determine how they were killed. It was even more crucial that Kiri not realize there was someone wandering around disguised as one of their own. That could come in handy.
'I'll have to wash this first, though.'
Not that it was that bloody. She'd worn worse before. No, it was more the faint traces of personal scent and the dango the nin had eaten and flecks of mud on the hem that told a story about the preteen boy who'd lived in the uniform not so long ago
She shuddered. Which wasn't like her at all. She didn't care about dead strangers. Not even preteens.
'I need to go to bed. I'm too tired to be sensible.'
Utakata huffed, sounding pissy. She glanced over- and her eyebrows shot up.
His body language was blown wide open- hips and feet pointed toward her, chest aligned- but his neck was twisted so that he could avoid looking at her. The overall effect was striking, but posed.
"If you're done crying over the sakura blossoms, I'd like to leave," he drawled. He was looking away and didn't catch her flinch- it was a common metaphor, but oh god it felt like a slap in the face. "I don't need your help, but I doubt you'll make it on your own."
'I get along fine.'
Aiko dredged up enough good humor to almost smile.
She should thank him and send him on his way. His offer was well-meant, but she would actually be better off alone. The Hiraishin was secret. They'd have to hoof it, if she went with him. Traveling like that would take much more time, and she would spend much more money on living expenses than otherwise. Really, it was a stupid idea.
"Thank you." She brushed dirt off her knees and didn't sway too much when she began walking. Bed. She was en route for a bed. Tonight she was going to treat herself to a nice hotel, possibly even a spa. She might even pay for it this time.
Utakata sniffed. He walked beside her, close enough that she was sure he could prop her if she wavered. "Don't thank me. I need my robe back. This is just until you wash it."
'It has a massive hole in it from the shuriken,' Aiko thought. 'It will have to be repaired or replaced. Has he not realized that?'
She kept her mouth shut.
"Do you plan on slowly bleeding out?"
Utakata sounded only mildly curious.
Aiko looked at her arm, bewildered about the whole thing. It had mostly stopped, hadn't it? She touched the skin. It hurt. Of course it did. "Uh. I don't have any medical supplies. It'll wait until I can wash it."
Her companion had apparently mastered an expression other than boredom. Unfortunately, it was, 'disbelieving.'
"No supplies at- How have you survived on your own? You're the worst missing nin I've ever heard of."
"But you've heard of me?" Aiko raised her eyebrows in surprise, tilting her head to the side.
"No."