A war rekindled [Flashback, Kimiko & Toshiro]

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

There were times that a white-haired special jounin from Konoha found that being part of a large clan, in the words of an acquaintance, blew chunks. To be exact that time had been several days ago when he found himself railroaded into his current situation.

When Toshiro had been asked by his father to collect the latest semi-regular reports, the special jounin had been... perturbed. As if he didn't have enough on his plate already between dealing with his genin team, chasing down leads on the homicidal sibling who had been thought safely dead until she sent a crazy swordsman after him, and the hundred-and-one other tasks that came with being between chuunin and jounin. Spending almost two weeks traveling between one village and the next picking up reports that in a wordy way said the same as ones before was not something that he wanted to have to fit into his plans for the near future. An opinion he had made very clear along with his view that something like that was better suited to a team of genin as a first-time C-rank mission instead of wasting a near-jounin's time with. It was an argument he had thought won after that as he had been about to leave before his father came up with a counter-argument - too bad no one warned him that his father wasn't the only party invested in the decision. A fact made very clear when the door to his father's office opened seemingly on its own until he looked down to see familiar reddish-blonde hair and expressive green eyes that had told Toshiro he was in a world of trouble. He might have nearly a foot of height over her and have been on his own for a few years but Toshiro's mother could still scare the daylights out of her son. Especially when she had what males called "The Look". Eyes narrowed, head tilted slightly to one side, slight frown, and arms folded under her chest - "The Look" was considered a precursor to fates best left unmentioned for messing something up and it had been clearly directed at him.

Turns out his mother had been the source of the idea of his collecting the reports, and for a reason most would never believe. Apparently his far more intimidating parent thought he hadn't been spending enough time with the young lady she clearly favored as his future spouse after a certain mission to recover a legendary weapon from a temple in Wind Country. Never one for subtle prodding if she felt a more direct approach would yield equivalent results faster, Hinamori-Hitsugya Momo came to the conclusion that the pair needed to spend more time together and away from "interruptions" for her plan to blossom on schedule. To that end his mother had, through methods both sneaky and terrifying, strong-armed her husband into changing his original idea of sending a few genin to one more suited to her ends while removing any "obstacles" in the way. The last such obstacle being her son's refusal to do things the easy way - an obstacle that was removed with the same ruthless directness as the others. "Toshiro. You will accept this assignment. You will be taking Kimiko along. She WILL not hear a single word of complaint out of you and you WILL see to that she enjoys herself. Is. That. Clear?" No doubt had the two genin who were regularly subjected Toshiro's version of training seen their teacher backed against a wall by a woman nearly a foot shorter and nodding faster than a puppet with a broken neck with his eyes almost comically wide in fear they would have been rolling around laughing and gasping about karma finally finding "bastard sensei".

Luckily for "bastard sensei" the only people in the room to see his total capitulation were his parents so his reputation wouldn't be utterly destroyed. And capitulate he had, in near-record time being packed and ready to go. Of course there had still been the matter of asking Kimiko if she was willing to tag along on this. Since it would mean at least ten days away from her genin team, family, and friends without an actual need he had not been confident she would say yes. Of course he had once again underestimated just how sneaky and determined his mother could be in her plans, the vague hope that Kimiko would say no having died as soon as he opened the strangely unlocked door to her apartment. The sight that greeted Toshiro was one of his siblings packing up his girlfriend while telling her that she needed to take time for herself now and then and that they would see to taking care of her genin team and other responsibilities while she was away. Right then it had become painfully obvious to the special jounin that his mother had anticipated every possible way he might wiggle out of her plan and ruthlessly closed it off. In the end the pair of special jounin had practically been shoved out the door by four all-too-cheery faces and told to enjoy themselves. Even a chance meeting with the Hokage where Toshiro have discretely brought up the possibility of their being needed for other assignments for hadn't helped. That... bastard had actually thought the whole premise was a good idea! He had even made it into an official assignment while hinting that he wanted them to take at least two weeks to do a thorough job of things and collecting information for their reports. Needless to say one white haired ninja had a very strong suspicion that he had once again been anticipated and outflanked.

That was how the pair found themselves on what amounted to an enforced vacation going from town to town in the border territory his clan administered doing something usually assigned to genin. Without the need for secrecy that the last time he had come this way with someone else the pair had been able to travel by roads and at a pace that was less rushed. Not to mention spending more nights at the various inns along the way instead of having to "rough it", a welcome change for Toshiro as waking up wondering how rocks and sticks always found the most uncomfortable places to poke when sleeping on the ground had long ago lost it's mystique. That and the much improved weather courtesy of the high point of summer had helped improve his mood, and the company kept had made this trip actually enjoyable compared the near-silence of his last trip. Plus he had been able to actually show Kimiko some of the places where the events his family had talked about happened. Then there was the next village on the list to collect a report from. Astride one of the few real roads through the area, the settlement was always busy and should be in the middle of one major fair as workers from the local mines, merchants buying materials from said mines, and the local population who serviced both converged on the village for a day-long fair. A fair Toshiro planned at some point to see if the young lady alongside him would like to attend. In the course of trying to slightly plan out the taller of the two Leaf-nins let his eyes wander over to where the village that was their destination should be. Given the dense woodlands and winding nature of the road it was of course impossible to actually see the village or surrounding fields that would be hosting the fair from where they were. What was visible was the smoke rising in the distance over where the village would be that piqued Toshiro's curiosity about the change in the usual schedule. "Strange. Usually they don't start the big fire pits going until evening. We might want to pick things up Kimi - looks like they started without us." On the heels of that the white haired male picked up the pace to a quick trot (at least by ninja standards) in the direction of the village.

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

Kimiko found it funny how ranks were given strange labels between each large leap. She was a Chuunin at present, as was her beloved Toshiro, but they had both been given the add-on of being called ‘Special’ Chuunin. It was laughable really; whenever she was asked for her rank, she always just said Chuunin. If she said her full title now, she felt that people would laugh at her for being ‘special’, so to speak. She was proving herself to be fully capable of a Jounin rank, but still had work to do before being promoted. Why couldn’t they just leave it at that rather than coming up with new ways to humiliate a shinobi? Having recently celebrated her eighteenth birthday, there was a great uproar about how close she was to being a Jounin at such a young age, along with her partner in crime, of course. Such was their relationship and bond that one name couldn’t be said without the other. It was always ‘Toshiro and Kimiko’, ‘Kimiko and Toshiro’, never really just the one name was mentioned anymore. It was a nice feeling; to be such a recognised couple that everybody just knew that they were together. For the ebony-haired female of the pair, it was good because she wouldn’t have any nosy competition trying to muscle their way in on her boyfriend. And for the white-haired male, he wouldn’t have any men attempting to steal his girlfriend away. In all fairness, the one who so much as tried (on either side) to separate the two wouldn’t live much longer after their attempt.

Such was their jealous- ahem, close bonds with one another.

Almost two weeks ago, Kimiko had been quite happily enjoying some time cleaning her messy apartment after it had housed a sleepover for her little sister and two of the squealing girlish monsters Aya called ‘friends’. The ebony-haired female had been supervising them all night, and they had still managed to create so much mess it wasn’t even funny in the slightest. Aya’s bedroom had been a disgrace with how many cartons of discarded milkshake there were, how many packets of sweets and other such confectionary there was strewn about, and how many poor dolls had lost their lives that night. The apartment’s owner had to take numerous trips down to the bins in order to get rid of all the stuff, even getting snappy enough to back-hand her nosy and unbelievably annoying elderly neighbour hard enough for the old woman to shut up. So having cleaned up all of the aforementioned mess and so much more that she hadn’t been aware of, in places she never thought would be possible to get messy (i.e. the tiny cupboard used for cleaning appliances… oh the irony), she was not best pleased to have the youngest Hinamori sibling enter her apartment claiming she needed a break and some time to herself. Her wonderfully clean apartment was ripped upside down once more as Aki tore out the contents of the Katsumi’s wardrobe to pack a suitcase, all the while saying that a break every once in a while would be a nice change of pace. “Aki…” Kimiko growled on one occasion when the girl ransacked the kitchen for gingerbread cookies as a snack. It was a sure sign of telling that the young woman’s patience was wearing thin when she called somebody by their name, as opposed to using a nickname or a cheery suffix at the end of their name. “I don’t need a break… I’m perfectly fine here…” Her tone was growing even tenser by the second, and the final straw had been when the suitcase of packed clothes had been dropped, making everything explode out again. At which point, Kimiko had demonstrated why she was dubbed ‘That surprisingly strong woman’ by punching the little girl from the living space of her apartment into the spare bedroom at the back of the humble abode.

Well, after those initial outbursts, she had been fine about it. In fact, she was even quite excited about a break alongside her beloved. It had been a long time since they had any real time together, especially since both of them had been run ragged with missions being thrown at them right left and centre. Then came their busy home lives too, even if the pair’s respective lives intertwined with one another. The Katsumi had been spending most of her free time at the Hinamori residence in order to learn how to become a good clan matriarch as of late, and all the lessons made the girl blush for one reason in particular. Her boyfriend’s mother was so adamant that the pair would get married; hence why these lessons were actually taking place. For when Kimiko would have to help run the clan as a strong female role. As if any more pressure could be burdened on the girl’s shoulders, it had been with these numerous lessons that took place twice a week at best, depending on whether she had missions or tasks to do. She had been swayed to go on this trip after somebody had vowed to cover her Genin team while she was away, and that had put her at ease. Her pet falcon, Susu, could always find refuge at her father’s home, or at the Hinamori residence where Aki or Momiji would take care of him. The former especially seemed to be rather fascinated with the messenger falcon, and liked to test his abilities of finding people rather often. On second thoughts, she hoped that Susu decided to go and live with her father instead of being subjected to Aki’s torment for a whole ten days.

The trip that Kimiko and Toshiro found themselves being forced on had been rather pleasant indeed. They had passed through numerous picturesque little villages and didn’t feel compelled to rush; not by any stretch of the imagination. They were able to rest in inns and small hotels as opposed to putting up camp out in the sticks, even if the latter was nice. The female of the pair had actually insisted that they stayed out for a night under the stars, but the idea had been shot down as soon as it was borne. Of course, sharing a nice warm room with a feather bed as opposed to a cold hard bed roll was much better, she couldn’t argue there. But there was a certain romanticism about laying out under the stars with a loved one that she couldn’t quite shake since she had become an avid reader of romance novels. Perhaps the most comedic part of their trip so far was the running gag of the ebony-haired female’s choice of belongings. She had re-packed the suitcase and had instead chosen a rucksack; much more practical for being on the road, of course. Inside said backpack were the bare minimum of what she would need. Underwear. Changes of clothes. Toiletries. And then there was the sheer amount of books. For the earlier parts of the journey, she had played weak and made Toshiro carry the bag for her. That was until the bag’s contents had spilled accidently while she was trying to grab a bottle of water from it during travel, and most of the books had scattered across the ground for her beloved to see. Although they weren’t sultry novels by any description, they were still books that she would rather had stayed in her rucksack. Her face had burned red for the rest of the day, even when they reached a hotel in a small town where a woman asked if Kimiko had sunburn from the lovely weather and offered some after sun cream to help it.

Since that day, she had kept her bag with her at all times, and read her books grudgingly after much ribbing from Toshiro, of course. They had travelled through some of the places that were detailed in the Hinamori clan history, and that really fascinated the ebony-haired female. Today’s destination was a small village whose fair was an event that her boyfriend wished to take her to see. With the other days’ embarrassment out of the way for good by now, Kimiko was excited for the fair that Toshiro had promised of this lovely little village. She kept a keen eye out ahead for the first signs of it, holding onto one side of her rucksack with one hand and clasping her boyfriend’s hand tightly with the other while they walked together down the windy little country road. She turned to him when he mentioned the rising smoke in the form of fire pits, and when she turned back to face the direction of the village her chocolate eyes were shining. “Fire, huh?” Was basically all she had heard. Fire was an obsession of hers, and rightly so since she was so well versed in the practise of Katon jutsu. Flames fascinated her, and she liked to toy with them just because she could do so without feeling the heat. “Well then, what’re we waiting for, eh?” She beamed, tilting her head to meet her boyfriend’s eyes with her own eager ones. To match his quickened pace, she took off at a delighted run, seeming to forget about everything else while she felt so happy. She felt literally on top of the world at present, and not just because of the mention of fire pits. Just everything mixed together made her feel so happy, so elated, so…

Alive.

That was until they actually arrived at the village. It hadn’t really registered to Kimiko that something was amiss until she was almost literally faced with the problem. There were no fire pits to be seen, and the smoke they had seen rising back down the road had been coming from buildings big and small. The streets were deserted while the buildings took flame, the fire catching onto other buildings due to the slight breeze fanning them. “Toshiro…” She spoke lowly, her voice matching the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. “This isn’t right… is it…” She didn’t even have to ask a question about it; she just knew it wasn’t right. Not at all. Everything but right, in fact.

Somebody had been here and left a message for them, little did she know, somebody who would like to see both of them dead. A certain clanless female especially.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Call it intuition gained through experience, a degree of precognition developed from years in a profession where death could come from anywhere at any time, or just plain gut instinct but after the initial upwelling of exuberance a nagging sense of wrongness had progressively grown bigger as the pair got closer to the village. At first he had put it down to his cautious (some would say paranoid) nature fueled by too many times of where the most unlikely (and worst possible) outcome was the one that happened. That unease had in fact got so strong that even before the pair of Leaf-nin rounded the last bend in the road Toshiro had unconsciously take the bow he kept for hunting out of its holster and notched an arrow. Maybe it was the lack of noise associated with a whole town celebrating that even a forest couldn't muffle, or the absence of wildlife in an area that was usually teeming with it but something had every instinct the special jounin had screaming danger. His first sight of the true source of the smoke assumed to come from fire pits proved that one should always listen to your instincts. Ruins. Instead of a village that should be bustling with people going stall to stall along streets and in fields decorated with more colors than a forest in autumn there was a field of ruins. Especially when the ruins are not the sort that resulted from long ago abandonment due to natural causes. These had been very recent as the buildings still stood and many were only partially burned, and none showed any of the signs that came with lightning strike or simple accident. No, these fires had every mark of being intentionally and recently set, in fact it was so obvious that whoever had done this could only have wanted even those passing by to know this was deliberate.

Maybe it was a sense of responsibility ingrained by a lifetime of training or just the normal reaction any human who hadn't killed off their humanity would have, but at that moment Toshiro felt something he hadn't in a while. Rage. The last time he had felt like this was seeing first-hand how low his now-rogue sister had sunk in her quest for power. Now that it was back and Toshiro didn't fight it in violation of every lesson about controlling ones emotions taught in the Academy. Oh no, this was exactly what he needed - being furious left no room for guilt, doubt, or other distractions. Right then he needed that clarity and focus to plan what came next. As satisfying as it would be to immediately set off to find the person behind all this there were things that had to come first. Among those first things was the safety of any survivors and especially the person next to him. Then came keeping the fires from starting a wildfire that would spread and cause not only more damage but eliminate any traces of the perpetrators. Briefly Toshiro spared a thank you that Lady Luck had stepped in on his side for once. Without Kimiko, and especially her way with people, doing everything that needed to be done first would almost impossible. Not to mention the sheer impossibility of getting any survivors - no doubt scared to death of anyone who looked dangerous - to listen to him. "Yes." Said without even looking in her direction, Toshiro confirmed that he was thinking along the same lines as Kimiko. The only visible sign of just how furious he was being slightly narrowed eyes and the way his fingers kept flexing around the hilt of the solitary sword he hadn't sealed away "just in case". "Try to find survivors. They might have fled into the woods. I'll see to putting these fires out before they spread." Plan made, Toshiro went to the nearest well to put his own plan into action without looking back. Some might have that lack of attention thought it was out of (misplaced) anger at Kimiko but if anything it was the opposite. While he would trust Kimiko with his life, right then he wasn't sure he could trust her with her own.

Why couldn't he trust his fellow ninja, and the young woman who he would give his life for if she asked it, with her own life? Somewhere deep in the most private recesses of his mind Toshiro could truthfully say it was because he had a very strong hunch about who had done this. And the last person he wanted to get caught up in the confrontation was the person closest to him. After all wasn't simply the threat of wholesale slaughter that kept the outlaws who occasionally hid in the region his clan called home from doing things like this. That threat was backed up by the militia every village was required to have and the ninja who lived among the population. An ever-present threat - reinforced by more ninja patrolling the area - that kept serious troublemakers well away. Stopping once he reached the well, the special jounin's fingers flew threw the seals and twisted his chakra until a column of water shaped somewhat like serpentine dragon rose from the well before twisting around to brush against the nearest fire. No sooner had that blaze been drowned then he "bent" his chakra and sent the water dragon rushing at another fire, systematically smothering each fire in turn with an icy calmness that belied the seething fury he was harboring. No, anyone attacking this town would have been faced with a major fight, especially since there would be not only the militia and ninja always here but the guards of the various merchants and those ninja tasked with protecting the shipments from the mines. All together it would be a force numbering well over a hundred armed and trained individuals. Even if the attacker had the element of surprise there would be signs of a struggle and non-combatants would have been able to raise the alarm. Unless, and this was the part that froze his blood before sending it to boiling, the attacker had been welcomed in then started the attack. Pulling that off would require a great deal of knowledge about not only this particular village, but the various patrol routes and hidden ways in the surrounding forest as well being someone that appeared trustworthy. There was only one person he knew who had all that information and the will to cause this much damage.

Soon enough the last of the fires were extinguished as the water dragon did its work, leaving most of the village with dripping wet roofs and a number of holes (new and widened), but no longer in danger of burning down or becoming the center of a wildfire. It was time to check for any survivors (or bodies) and see if his guess about the perpetrator(s) was right. To that end he picked what had looked to be the village headman's office as the first building entered. Originally two-storied the upper portion had mostly burned away but the upper upstairs floor had kept the interior. In fact other than that damage the rest of the home was surprisingly intact. Even the front door was in one piece, opening to a gentle shove easily to show an interior that seemed almost pristine if with no lighting besides the sunlight coming in through the door and barely noticeable behind closed drapes. Taking several steps in on the floor that squeaked with each step taken the special jounin stopped to look around. Then abruptly spun with around with his full speed, sword slicing just below the level of his chin. The ear-torturing screech of steel scraping steel matched perfectly the malice-filled grin Toshiro sported as his longer blade ran down the shorter weapons length until it locked against the minimal guard. Looking down on the would-be attacker the special jounin didn't even blink at the sight of an obviously female ANBU in full uniform trying to stick an especially long kunai in his skull. "If you're going to ambush someone in a building, don't pick one that obviously was spared for a reason. And floors don't squeak four times for three steps." The words were almost lecturing in tone, and caused the would-be assassin to look up out of reflex. Action, reaction, and the small details both revealed provided the final proof Toshiro needed to be absolutely sure about who this was. What came next could have been spoken by an entirely different person or even another species if one went by the positively glacial chill that didn't try to mask the hate words conveyed.

"You should have kept running when you had the chance... nee-san."

Toshiro: 155 CP - 12 = 143 CP

Spoiler:

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

It was just her luck that she had chosen a rather impractical outfit to be dealing with such a thing today. That being said, it was nothing new for the ebony-haired girl; she almost always wore outfits and clothing that others scoffed at for being impossible to move in, and she still managed to prove them wrong. If Toshiro was worried about looking menacing, Kimiko was doubtful about the survivors taking her seriously. She was wearing a beautiful summer dress, white with lace patterns on the bodice, and a pair of comfortable brown sandals that laced around her ankles. Her long ebony locks were tied in twin tails that were pulled forward to sit in front of her shoulders, the hair bands matching the colour of the dress. She looked like she was about to embark on a spiffing picnic as opposed to conducting a rescue mission for the possible survivors in the area, but she wasn’t about to let that stop her. She shifted her rucksack so that it was more comfortable on her back, and nodded to show that she understood the orders that were expected of her. While she was away checking for survivors, her beloved would be putting out the fires and trying to rescue the remaining buildings that hadn’t been burnt. “Got it.” She spoke curtly, and it could be interpreted that she was being snappy. But she didn’t have anything more to say on the matter; so why should she stick around to wait? Toshiro was relying on her for something, and she couldn’t let him down. She took off through the little village, not feeling the heat around her body as much as she should have done to be classified as ‘normal’. For as long as she could remember, she had been trained in the arts of fire and flames, and that kind of immunity to burning and heat was slowly building. Her wholly impractical dress trailed in the slight breeze behind her while she ran, making her way to the woodland in order to find the poor townspeople who were no doubt terrified by the ordeal.

Her footfalls began to soften as she reached the grassy area, and the occasional crunch of a leaf signified her approach to whoever was in the area. Other than that, the only sounds were those of distant nature. Birds were chirping an uneasy afternoon song, rodents and small critters were scampering away at the sound of somebody nearing where they were situated. Kimiko couldn’t hear any human sounds, like breathing, soft chatter or anything of the like. If anybody was out here, they were being very quiet; making it clear that they were fearful of something. The kunoichi slowed to a stop and chewed on her lip in thought, trying to decide where she should go. The forest here was large, and she could end up running through it all day back and forth like a yo-yo when really, she needed to find the survivors, and soon. “Hello?” She raised her voice slightly, but not quite to the volume of a shout as not to draw too much attention to herself. She heard the sounds of birds flapping away as she continued to walk deeper into the forest, hearing her approach and wanting to make a hasty get-away. Still no sight nor sound of anything human in the area. ‘But there must be somebody out here somewhere…’ She thought to herself, stepping carefully in amongst the fallen leaves and twigs as not to make too much noise. She looked this way and that, trying to determine where to go and why. But she felt as if she had run out of luck. That was until she heard the sound of rustling behind her from a number of tall shrubs. She turned on the spot, dress swirling and hair flying as she kept her chocolate eyes wide to see who or what was there. A middle-aged man holding a long rake with a ruddy head, splattered with either mud or blood, faced her now. He was not much taller than her, with long-ish brown hair flecked with grey. His eyes were a cold grey, and full of wariness. “It’s not her.” A voice reached out of nowhere. The shrubs rustled once more and this time a teenage boy stumbled out, standing beside the man holding a rake. “No… but that doesn’t mean we can trust her.” The man said lowly, almost unaware that Kimiko might be able to hear them.

‘Her? Does that mean…’ She thought slowly, her eyes dimming the more she considered it. ‘They were attacked by a female?’ She started forward one step, only to have the rake thrust forwards at her harshly. “No further, girlie! Just keep going through this forest and we won’t have to hurt ye’!” The man cried out, wielding his rake like anybody else would wield a blade. Kimiko held her hands up in a placating gesture, showing that she had no weapon about her person and only her rucksack on her back. She was actually carrying kunai in a pouch strapped on her upper right thigh, but they didn’t need to know that. They were afraid as it was, and any sign of hostility or possible fighting would perturb them. “I’m not your enemy, I promise. I’m a kunoichi of Konoha… a Special Jounin…” She spoke slowly, nodding her head to emphasise what she was saying. “I don’t see no headband.” The man retorted quickly. He certainly was a sharp one in spite of his accent and appearance. The Konoha nin reached a hand back to her rucksack and untied the green material fastened to the hand-hold at the top, revealing a forehead protector with the Leaf Village’s insignia on the metal plating. She threw it down in front of her, the metal glinting in the faint light of the sun that filtered down through the tree canopies. The teenage boy scuttled forward and picked the forehead protector up, inspecting it and touching it to test whether it was fake or not. When he seemed satisfied, he nodded his head and threw it back at Kimiko for her to catch. “That’s real alright. You got a name?” He asked as the kunoichi was allowed to come closer. She tied her headband around her forehead while doing so, making sure that her identity would be known from then onwards. “I’m Katsumi Kimiko.” She said with a smile, holding out her hand for the teenage boy and his father to shake. They did, albeit hesitantly, and seemed much more at ease knowing that she wouldn’t cause them any harm.

She learnt that the father of the pair was called Hishui, and his son was Funiki. They had been separated from the rest of the survivors while fleeing from the burning village, and had decided to stay here until they deemed it safe to continue and find the others. “Do you know where they are? The other villagers that survived?” The Konoha Nin prompted, hoping to go there next and find out who was exactly responsible for this. She had previously asked this pair, but they didn’t know; they only knew that the person’s gender due to talk of it from other townspeople. “I’ve got a pretty good idea.” Hishui nodded his head. “There was a fire here in the past, a natural one, that is. We all fled to a part of the far woodlands where there was space to set up a bit of a stockade. I’d imagine that would be where the rest have gone.” He guessed, and so it was settled. “Stick with me, both of you, and I’ll protect you from whoever it might have been that caused this mess. That is… if they’re around this area at all.” Kimiko gave the pair a reassuring smile and after being given directions, she set out at the head of their little party of three. Funiki walked behind her, and Hishui walked at the back. The man claimed that he had been a basic shinobi in his youth, and had the training but didn’t follow it very far before love gave him a reason to live instead of risking his life almost every day. By trade now, he was a maker of exotic weapons; one of the village’s most expensive and valuable exports. His son wished to travel to Konoha to live and become a shinobi there, where his father was born and raised in his youth. In spite of the awful thing that had happened to their village, the kunoichi travelling with them was happy in a way that it had panned out this way. She had met this pair when otherwise it would be unlikely, and that was destiny interfering at its finest, as she saw it. She decided not to ask about what had happened to Hishui’s wife; she may have passed away some time ago, or been claimed by the fire. Because she had not been mentioned to have continued with the rest, Kimiko couldn’t help but assume the worst.

She thought about what the man had said about love, and how it had changed his life from being a shinobi to live for this woman. She also considered her relationship with Toshiro, and how both of them risked their lives every day, but still continued down their dangerous chosen path of career. They both recognised the dangers that came with being a shinobi, and for her especially she knew it was necessary for her to achieve her goal; for her to become Hokage and stop all war in this world. How could she accomplish those things if she wasn’t a shinobi? It was possible for civilians to make changes to the world, that much was obvious, but in the way she wished to change it, she needed to keep following the dangerous path. Perhaps it was wrong, perhaps she should give up her career for the sake of living for Toshiro and her family, her friends and her village… but then what would she have to live for every day? She knew she was making the correct choice, and although Hishui had thought differently to her, she wouldn’t change anything.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

If ever Hinamori Asusha had entertained hopes of forgiveness and reconciliation with her brother, they died there and the ashes left were cold at the absolute chill in her brother's voice. Grey eyes behind the stolen ANBU mask went wide as the pressure on her over-long kunai increased by more than double - only reflexes gained from facing her opponent for years in spars had her leaping back before her guard was completely overpowered in a surge of brute strength. Fixated on the long blade that had used the left-over force to continue in a cut that a fraction of a second soon would have take out her eyes, Asusha never saw the straight kick that followed in the cuts wake. Brutal and direct the blow sent her flying into the brick fireplace further away from the door with a painful impact only partially mitigated. In a momentary daze, the rogue Konoha-nin silently cursed how things have abruptly taken a turn for the worse. Everything had been going so well too! She and her small band of hired swords had snuck past the patrols using hidden routes and - disguised as Konoha merchants traveling under ANBU escort - gotten inside the village using her old clan crest. Once inside and among the rowdy crowd it has been easy to place explosive notes on the buildings. One signal and the result had been mass-chaos and carnage as those defenders not caught in the explosions or flames were cut down by her hired swords who threw off their disguises. Of course it had been a messy fight and she had lost nearly three quarters of her cannon-fodder but surprise had let only a handful escape into the woods and the rest of the survivors had been herded into a improvised stockade in the woods to be used as hostages, slave labor for her own planned village, or test subjects as she wished. Then she had settled into wait in this building, confident that her brother would be the one to go after her cannon fodder while the love-blind fool sent his precious whore to check the buildings for survivors believing it to be the "safer" course. Recovering her wits barely in time, the rogue Hinamori frantically rolled to the side to avoid the downward cut that had it connected would have severed her leg. Then Asusha struggled to bring her long kunai up in time to block the follow-up upwards cut that locked the two blades. Even then she needed both hands to keep the longer blade from closing the scarce fractions of an inch it would need to spill her guts.

Somehow that decision to wait inside the building was when her plan had started to go horribly wrong. Instead of a weak girl with no clan that she could take easily overpower and take hostage, her triple-damned brother himself had been the one to enter! She had been overjoyed when one of her few surviving spies in Konoha had told her that the pair had been sent to gather the reports from the village, but she didn't want to face him alone in a direct confrontation. A jounin she might be but her brother and older twin had always been head and shoulders above the rest of their parent's brood when it came to close combat while she had focused almost exclusively on medical techniques and sealing. Facing him in an enclosed space with precious little room to maneuver and locked in a situation where even a momentary lapse to form a handseal would have his sword exploring her guts was the absolute last place she wanted to face him. Especially like this! No one knew that when she was having nightmares of her brush with death in Demon's Rest the part that scared her the most hadn't been nearly dying. No it was the way her little brother had coldly mocked her and arranged for her to die in an especially gruesome manner. She would never admit it but that was the first time in years that Asusha had been afraid. That fear had come back full-force as the full danger of the situation she was in settled on her.

On the other side of the locked blades, Toshiro was ecstatic. He knew that as long as her hands were occupied his sister had very little in the way of options. Those options were further limited by her decision to set up an ambush in an enclosed space, leaving her precious little room for her usual evade-then-strike tactics. For the first time since the full nature of Asusha's trespasses had become clear, he was calling the tune and making her dance to it while fully aware of that when it ended she would be dead. He hadn't exactly dreamed of this but the thought that some day he would repay her for the lives her ambition had ruined was forgotten either. The intensity of emotion that idea created was matched by the force the special jounin abruptly exerted through his longer blade, shoving his sister up and against the fireplaces mantle with tooth-rattling force. Before she could recover enough to counter, Toshiro initiated one of the first weapon technique utilized with a sword he had learned. Bringing his blade in a basic downward slash he grinned as it was dodged by the narrowest of margins and grinned wider as her whole body went from relief to horror as the realization that she hadn't been the target. Just in to have her back assaulted by the hail of stone splinters that were the result of her brother's attack smashing in to the mantle. Individually minor, the pain from several thousand needle-size pieces of marble slicing through cloth, leather, and flesh was still more than enough to elicit a scream from the fake ANBU. A scream that was regretted even as the long-bladed kunai was raised to block the strike aimed at the throat that had emitted the sound which gave away the owners location in the cloud of dust that had been kicked up. Normally the over-sized kunai would have (probably) held but reflex had over-ruled memory about why blocking Toshiro's strikes with a weapon could be a bad thing. Instead of a normal if fatal strike, at the last moment the longer blade moved downward - striking the mutated kunai where hilt and blade joined. The results were as predictable as spectacular - stressed at its weakest point Asusha's weapon snapped with a tortured scream. Instinct or memory of the last time her brother had used that trick against her, Asusha threw dignity and grace to the wind to land on her rear. An action that kept her cranium from having a new addition made of steel and opened up several feet of space between the siblings.

Glaring at his rogue sister Toshiro didn't press his advantage as much as he wanted to. Instead he placed himself squarely between the door and Asusha even as his older sister's hands went through handseals and began to glow green. As badly as he wanted to violently hack her into pieces there was one thing he needed more - information. In the past months her name simply came up too many times in too many places connected to enough activities that he was sure someone was helping, if not bankrolling, her plans. Toshiro wanted the name of that person or group and he knew just how to get it. Like most people Asusha had one or more issues that if brought up could get her upset and when upset she tended to not watch what came out of her mouth. Chief among those hot-button issues was being considered weak and especially being compared unfavorable with her siblings. All he had to do was push those buttons in the right order. "Hurts doesn't it nee-san." Seeing his sister's eyes focus on him Toshiro let out a just a tiny grin of mixed malice and superiority. 'Hook.' Asusha's puzzled expression proof enough to the special jounin that she had no idea what he was planning. "Knowing that after everything you've done, everything you gave up for power, you're still no match for me. Even Aki was better than this. How does it feel to be below someone who was called "dead last"?" Right on schedule Toshiro saw his sibling's eyebrow go from still to jumping around like a deranged cricket. 'Line.' Just one more push and soon he would know everything he wanted to. "You are weak Asusha." In the seconds between his words and Asusha's reaction Toshiro could see in his sister's face just how hard his judgment had struck. Then there was precious little time to think as one nuke-nin did her utmost to cut him into little pieces while screaming partially-intelligible words. The little bits and pieces, mostly names and promises made, he got from those words were filed away for later when he could put them together into a whole picture. Instead Toshiro kept dodging and blocking the strikes, confident he could outlast his sibling in her current berserk state of mind. 'and sinker.' Now he just needed to have a little patience.

Toshiro: 143 CP - 19 = 124 CP

Spoiler:

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

For the majority of the trio’s trek through the woods, they remained silent, save for the occasional comment on things being ‘clear’ up ahead by the leader of the pack. Kimiko had been on high alert since they had passed the natural shelter that Hishui had pointed out that survivors might have made their way to, since nobody was in sight around the area. With both her native guides drawing a blank about what must have happened, she was left to try and figure out the full picture. A supposedly random village in the middle of nowhere within the Fire Country had been attacked and put to the torch, letting only a handful of villagers escape. Whatever had happened must have been pretty brutal, but in the village itself there had been no visible sign of conflict. Only burning buildings. Both father and son hadn’t seen anything that was of any use to their cause of trying to find other survivors; they had been inside the family workshop and only heard what was happening as panic. They evacuated quickly, quickly enough that they were able to escape the fates of others that were unable to move fast enough to avoid the burning buildings. By the sounds of things, there must have been accomplices to the main culprit, who by the sounds of things was described as being a female that set off explosive tags to create the fires and wreckage. Since her close shave while facing off against two B-Ranked Missing Nin almost two years ago, the Konoha Special Jounin hadn’t had much contact with the outlaw types, and didn’t keep up to date with the bingo book either, so she didn’t have any clue about who could have committed the crime.

It truly was a mess.

Just as they were about to exit the wooded area, Hishui called the party to a stop using a silent series of hand signals. The three ducked and knelt behind a row of shrubs, peering over the tops while the man contemplated what he had made them stop for. “Something’s not right.” He claimed quietly, leaning close to say it so that Kimiko would definitely hear. She wasn’t a local in these parts, so she wouldn’t usually know what was wrong and what was right, but she had a bad feeling of what could be ahead too. It was strange; call it a shinobi’s intuition, but there was a feeling of ominous origins ahead of them, and it was something that they had to be cautious of, that was for certain. She nodded in response, placing a finger to her lips to show that they should be silent while they tried to get closer in order to inspect what wasn’t quite right about their surroundings. She silently got back to her feet, moving with stealth that came with years of practise. And to say that she wasn’t usually so big on stealthy approaches, she did remarkably well. Hishui and Funiki moved quietly too with much care by the sounds of things, or rather, the lack of sound at all. They moved from tree to tree until they reached the far side of the woodland. From that point, there was a procession of small shrubs and forest fauna, so they would have cover available even if they were moving into a clearing. The Katsumi female had long since learnt that even if stealth was ‘boring’, it was much better than heading in all guns blazing when the threat wasn’t known. She was able to learn from her past mistakes and make things right, especially when in a potentially dangerous situation with innocent people to protect.

She crouched down on her hands and knees to move behind the shrubs and other plants, keeping an eye peeled while doing so. In the gaps between leaves on the respective plant life, she couldn’t see much in the clearing that she now had a side-view of. Ahead, there was a grassy hill which, in all honesty, wasn’t very high, but it separated the clearing well enough. She turned to face the clearing from her angle and saw a stretch of grassy field with a couple of solitary trees standing in the centre. Over in the distance, a natural little alcove of rocky, muddy ground rose up from the lush ground, making it seem almost out of place. But such occurrences were common in the Fire Country; Kimiko knew that for a fact from training in numerous areas with her father for almost three years. From her current angle, she could see the partial view of a small… trodden pathway. Curious, she quickened her crawling pace slightly, and when she saw what the grassy path led to, she stopped dead in her tracks, almost causing a startled Funiki to crawl straight up her rear. Now that she was at a better angle, she could see that the pathway led to the other side of the alcove, but that wasn’t what had startled her.

It was the fact that she saw big burly men, each wielding ruddy weapons and penning in a group of terrified civilians.

Her blood began to boil while she surveyed the scene from afar. The men had gathered fallen logs and other such things to create a stockade to keep the civilians inside. Although she was a fair distance away, she could see the terrified faces of the men and women being held captive, and what sickened her more was the fact that children were present too. Poor, innocent children who had been swept along. And for what reason? Her mind started to draw conclusions that these men were part of the attack on the village, because why else would they target a group of disorientated civilians stumbling through the woods to try and find safety? It all started to add up, even if she was without a real culprit, at least she knew these men were bad news.

She gestured to Hishui and Funiki that they should stay where they were while she moved in, and when both started to protest, she held a hand up to show that she didn’t even want to hear it. This was her fight, and she would never forgive herself if innocent people were injured because of her not being able to handle a few brutes. She crept out of the fauna that had been hiding her only moments ago and moved swiftly across the clearing, keeping low to the ground and moving soundlessly on the soft grass. When she reached the far side, near where her opponents were, she took a pause and edged along the line of trees currently hiding her from their view. Her back was towards the woodland, her head turned to the side while she moved ever closer, managing to creep close enough to peer discretely round the corner and calculate tactics. There was a group of five men, each one wielding a katana of their own and equipped with basic shinobi gear by the looks of things. All of them were non-descript, each more generic-looking than the next. They must have harboured some strength otherwise the civilians wouldn’t have been cowed into looking so terrified otherwise, but they were nothing to be afraid of. The one closest to her had a black box tucked into his belt at his lower back, and judging by the wire leading from it to his front, she guessed it was a radio mic; like the ones she had to communicate with mission partners during such tasks. ‘He has to go first before he radios for back-up… assuming that they have any, but I’m going to guess that they do.’ She thought. Plan made, she decided to move in for the strike. She drew a familiar small seal on her middle finger, not wanting to cause too much fuss as not to harm the innocents that could become tangled in the fray. This attack would keep it contained, she was sure of that.

None of the men knew she was coming, even after she had struck the man wielding a radio and taken him down. They only took notice when they heard a loud screaming static noise from a broken electrical item and saw the Katsumi stood over their unconscious comrade with an expectant smirk on her lips. “That was almost too easy.” She sunk low into a fighting stance, holding out one of her hands and moving it back towards her a couple of times in the well-known generic gesture of ‘bring it’, wishing for them to make the move on her. “Come on then, boys. Let’s dance.”

Justu Used:

Chakra Remaining:

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Bending forward to avoid a swipe at his throat, one of Konoha's youngest tokubetsu jounin responded with a raised knee to the gut. The wind knocked out of the would-be ambusher Toshiro's next action capitalized on that by slamming the hilt of his solitary blade into the porcelain tiger mask covering his sister’s face. Intended to withstand small impacts such as shrapnel, the mask shattered on impact. If not for the layer of cloth glued to the back just for this case the shards of ceramic would have likely done far worse than simply slicing Asusha's skin as she reeled backwards until her back was against a wall. Like the other times he had driven her back Toshiro didn't press his advantage. In the past few minutes his hasty plan had yielded useful results but he still needed the name(s) of whoever was making her plans possible. Plus he had a new question to be answered. Looking across the room at his adversary, Toshiro couldn't help but wonder what his sister had been doing in the months since going rogue. He had expected to have an easy go of things for the first few minutes after having her plan ruined threw off Asusha's equilibrium. That things had kept going that good for the last few minutes however and that was making the snow-haired special jounin suspicious. It hadn't been that long ago that she had been able to at least make him work for the victory in spars. Even if she was blinded by rage Toshiro had expected his sister to have at least remembered and use basic jutsu and a larger variety of ejutsu technique instead of just her chakra scalpels. Instead, with that one exception, Asusha's current method reminded her brother more of a drunken brawler than anything else in their lack of effectiveness.

If that lack of her normal tactics hadn't made him suspicious Toshiro might have been caught flat-footed as his sister abruptly changed tactics. As it stood he had just enough time to follow his gut instinct in booting a footstool up as soon as his opponent started familiar handseals. Later he would say it was the most valiant footstool ever, stopping the volley of water bullets aimed at Toshiro's head at the price of being reduced to pieces of stuffing and scraps of leather. Such an end was also met by several chairs, a couch, and the walls as the special jounin had to dodge a slew of different suiton jutsu that gave him a partial answer to one of his questions. Somehow his sister, who had shown no interest at all in ninjutsu in the past, had gotten a whole lot better than he remembered. Who had taught her, and in exchange for what, were questions shelved for much later along with the whole "get her riled up until she lets the information slip" plan he had hastily formed. Barely avoiding another jutsu that tore up the floor by rolling to the side, Toshiro determined that he no longer could afford to draw the fight out - even if he avoided every attack there might not be a village to save if this kept up. Trading places with a wall clock through a kawarimi to avoid another barrage of water bullets, the special jounin used the respite to bring his trump card into play.

Outside the building the water in the village well stirred and that trump card rose in response to its creator's silent command. With a silent roar the water dragon, sent to hide in the well incase of future need, barreled across empty square and through one of the walls then out the other. In the process it engulfed one very shocked Konoha missing-nin who had been dodging a truly obscene amount of kunai when the liquid monstrosity had burst through the wall - surprise, limited room, and the jutsu's sheer size making it impossible to dodge. Looking out the exit hole in what was left of the wall; Toshiro couldn't keep from wincing at the damage he was now responsible for. Not only was this house (the largest in town) a total loss, but his watery blindside had taken out two more buildings in a direct line and part of what might have been a smithy before slamming against a stone wall that had (mostly) withstood the impact. There was no doubt in his mind that he was going to hear about causing so much widespread destruction in taking out just one missing-nin. As he stepped through the hole marking the path of destruction to make sure his sister was actually dead (or correct that oversight if she wasn't), Toshiro couldn't help but wonder how he was going to explain this. 'Oh well, at least she's down for the count. No one walks away from that unscathed.'

Famous last words and fittingly ironic. No sooner had the tokebetsu jounin reached the rubble and poked his head into the hole than he was frantically backpedaling. Not only to get away from the four shuriken that instead of lodging in his cranium sliced his shoulder, but to avoid the tornado of water that erupted out of nowhere only moments after he had vacated that area. Dissipating almost as soon as it had formed, out of the demolished building stepped the last person he expected, or wanted, to see alive. True to the literal meaning of his unvoiced wish, his rogue sister had clearly she had seen better days. Her reddish-brown hair was matted with blood from a head wound, the stolen uniform missing whole pieces, and the ANBU mask was little more than a shard that even then fell off. That and the way one arm hung at her side was clear evidence that Asusha had not escaped unscathed if not nearly as damaged as her brother had hoped. Still Toshiro believed he had the advantage with his sister unable to use jutsu even with the strange numbness in his left shoulder slowing him down. Now that the formalities were out of the way it was time to get serious about ending his sibling's existence.

Toshiro: 124 - 5 = 119 CP

Spoiler:

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

Kimiko was none the wiser to the session of rough and tumble between brother and sister not so far away in the wrecked village itself, but if she was, no doubt she’d be furious and charge in to her beloved’s aid. She still didn’t even know who was behind this mess, but she had a feeling that she would soon find out. The burly men stood facing her wore faces of shock, and it seemed to take them a while to comprehend what had just happened to their unconscious team mate. As for the hostages, they looked on in absolute awe; obviously grateful for the help, but not quite understanding where it came from. The Konoha nin’s headband gleamed in the dappled light that broke through the tree canopies, and her grin still hadn’t faded. A few of her pearly whites were on show, brighter than usual thanks to the illumination from the sunlight. Although in reality the two sides had barely faced off for a few seconds, it seemed as if they had been staring one another down for much longer than that.

Her eyes locked onto a hand movement used by the man closest to her as he reached for his katana, and she was already on the offensive. She found good footing on the ground beneath her and leapt forward in amongst the group of four men, having drawn a kunai that she used to counter the anticipated blow from a katana. She whirled round as if she were partaking in a dance, not a deadly battle, slashing with her kunai towards the face of her current attacker. He dodged most of the slash, but was caught at the chin with the latter part of the uppercut. He cursed and cried out at the slicing pain, recoiling his head with one hand flying to his chin as if to comfort the wound, and Kimiko took her chance with this one. Her kunai flashed three more times in three calculated strikes; one aimed for his katana arm, the other at his chest, and the last one at his abdomen. Unable to dodge or block all of the strikes, his abdomen received a long horizontal slice. That was a killing blow, she knew that much. Blood started to soak through the man’s black garb, and he crumpled to his knees to fall face down on the ground. Three more were left, and they were already closing in on her from three separate angles. She brought her hands together swiftly, focusing her chakra to a single point within her body to concentrate it, and when her opponents were within a close enough range of her, she expelled the pent up chakra in a devastating blast. “Hi no Ishi!” She cried out, her will of fire being fanned by the great gale that she produced to send the men flying. One impacted hard with a tree and fell to the ground motionless, one was thrown across the ground for a fair few feet, and the other managed to use his blade to steady his balance and come at her again.

It was an interesting improvised move, she would give him that, striking the ground with a katana and letting it absorb the impact as he was blown backwards in such a fashion, but that alone wouldn’t win him this fight. “Hana Chirimai!” She called out next, her hands flying through familiar hand seals that ended in the iconic ram sign. A great vortex of wind sprouted from the ground in front of the jutsu’s caster, sweeping a great number of fallen flower petals inside the gale; hence the technique’s name. Her opponent had seen the incoming gale and was ready to back off to dodge it, but wasn’t aware of the jutsu’s ability to travel. Kimiko held out a hand and moved it in the man’s direction, and the jutsu followed persistently, able to travel much faster than he could run. He was caught up in the jutsu and with a great cry, crumpled to the ground after it was dispelled. The other man who hadn’t smacked against a tree and had instead rolled for a great distance had managed to get back on his feet during the time that she had taken out his companion, and was making a charge at her now. Within the confines of her mind, she realised that she had used a lot of Fuuton jutsu thus far, and should mix it up a little with a fiery Katon technique just to end this off nicely. Her hands flashed through yet more seals, and she could feel the fiery chakra build up inside her body. “Hibashiri!” She exclaimed, holding out both her palms in the direction of her opponent. A jet of flames shot from each outstretched palm, twisting and turning and snaking across the clearing. The two jets wrapped around each other in a kind of fiery plait, making for a much more powerful blast of fire as it engulfed the unsuspecting, helpless target who writhed, cried and screamed in pain upon impact. After the flames had dispersed, and the five men were revealed to either be dead, dying or unconscious, the captives let out a collective sigh of relief.

Kimiko turned and gave the group a smile as they cheered for her in thanks, and she made her way towards them in order to save them from their hold, and to find out more information about their ordeal. Along with the help of Hishui and his son Funiki, she moved the ruddy blockade of felled logs, heavy wooden crates (which all proved to be empty) and other such materials. The villagers flooded out and into the clearing, embracing one another and enjoying their freedom. One of them, a woman of middling height and growing old in years, approached their saviour and clasped her hands together in front of her as a sign of gratitude. “We thank you so much for your efforts.” The old woman said humbly, bowing her head in respect while the other villagers, bar Hishui and Funiki, followed suit. “It’s quite alright, it’s what I’m here to do!” The Katsumi waved held up her hands to try and stop the villagers showing her so much gratitude and laughed a little uneasily. She learnt that the old woman’s name was Sayuri, one of the governors in their small community. The majority of the villagers kept their identities a secret, however, and that was ultimately their choice at the end of the day. Kimiko shared her name with them and explained why she was in the area and what she had seen, afterwards prompting them to share their stories. Sayuri seemed to be the spokeswoman for the rest of the villagers, suddenly wearing a grave expression in her watery green eyes. “As you already know, Katsumi-san, today is our village’s proud festival; the greatest tourist attraction for us that is held every year. We are a small community and rely on revenue from travellers, so this event is always a godsend for us. Many travel to see it, like you have today.” She paused, glancing in the direction where their ruined village lay. “But someone and a band of thugs chose to take that from us.”

The old woman went on to explain that nobody had expected it of the person who came visiting. She was dressed in a Konoha ANBU uniform and had a small group of men with her, claiming to be a guard for the group of men she was with who were merchants themselves. The village’s gate-guard, who had been killed in the ruckus that ensued in the fires, had been wary, but the woman presented a family crest that removed his doubts and allowed her to pass through. Kimiko immediately grew suspicious and felt a great sense of foreboding rise in her stomach; she felt as if she wanted to be sick. “Do you know what crest this was?” She asked, trying to keep the tone of desperation out of her voice. Sayuri must have noticed that it was a lost effort and eyed their saviour critically, nodding her head slowly and detailing the crest. “It was a silver starburst… is that important?” So there it was; the truth was in black and white.

Asusha had been behind this ordeal.

The Katsumi didn’t know what made her feel worse; the fact that Asusha had used her old clan crest to gain entrance into this village even after she had gone rogue from her family and her village, or that she had blown the village to pieces. What didn’t make sense was why she did the latter. Had she been feeling particularly malicious today? ‘Oh, if only she had died at Demon’s Rest…’ Kimiko cursed silently to herself, her chocolate brown eyes clouded with worry. That could mean that Asusha was still prowling around the village, and that was where Toshiro was right now. She chewed her lip in deep thought, knowing that she had two choices. She could either escort the survivors to safety, or go back to the village and investigate what was going on there. Although her heart was telling her that Toshiro could be in danger, her head was telling her otherwise. It was a slim chance indeed that Asusha was still here, but it was seeming all the more likely now that Kimiko was putting the numerous pieces together. The men she had taken down were guarding the villagers, ready for something. That must have been an order by their mistress, surely. Otherwise, it just wouldn’t make sense. If the worst had happened and Toshiro had already met his sister in the ruined village, a battle would have ensued, and chances are her beloved had already… lost. This was a worst case scenario, of course; but it was wholly possible. Asusha was a Jounin, a powerful one driven by rage and hatred. Nothing or nobody would stand in the way of what she wanted, even if it was her little brother. Toshiro had sent Kimiko this way for a reason; it was a possibility that he had known all along that Asusha was behind this mess and sent her out of the way. Ultimately, his older sister was after her for whatever reason.

“It’s dangerous to go back to the village.” She said to the villagers, squaring her shoulders and taking a deep breath. “I’ll escort you to your safe-house that Hishui has told me about, and protect you when we reach it. There may be more of the men who had taken you hostage earlier.” Decision made, she organised a single file line of the villagers and walked at the head of them, ordering Hishui to stay at the mid-section and Funiki to stay at the back in order to protect the rest. ‘Stay safe, Toshiro… I won’t betray your wishes…’

Jutsu Used:

Chakra Remaining:

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

At some point in the past the words "easier said than done" had been codified to mean that while something seemed simple it was in fact very difficult. Toshiro would have labeled difficult as mild when it came to describing the trouble he was having turning the resolve to terminate his older sister into results. While Kimiko had been taking out the trash with relative ease, her boyfriend had struggled to get back into control of his own fight. Mostly due to Asusha's ability to evade attack no longer being restricted by lack of space. That ability to avoid serious injury, plus the difficulty Toshiro was having in putting his full strength behind attacks courtesy of how numb his left shoulder and upper arm had gotten since the poisoned shuriken had nicked them, had kept Asusha in a fight that otherwise would have been decided already. As things stood now however the only thing that working in the special jounin's favor was that he had kept his sibling from being able to repair her damaged arm. Every time Asusha had tried to get enough time to use eijutsu to do that, her brother would close the distance in a blur and launch a flurry of one-handed strikes that made for their lack of power with speed and sheer numbers. So for up to now the situation had been at a stalemate - Toshiro unwilling to let the monster wearing his sister's face go but unable to land a decisive blow, and said monster unable to go on the offensive but knowing that she couldn't outrun her brother.

So now the pair faced each other over a mere handful of paces with the knowledge that whoever made the first mistake would be the one to die. In this case that mistake came in the roar and flash of flames along with the screams of those caught inside them that reached the village ruins. How he knew it he couldn't say, but Toshiro was that in those flames whatever reinforcements Asusha had brought along had gone up in smoke along with here plan. Now to capitalize on that blow. "I hope you weren't depending on whoever that was, nee-san. It sounds like Kimi-chan lived up to her moniker again." Right on cue Asusha's face went from pale to sheet white with fury and whipped around to look at the place where the single person she loathed above all others had once again ruined her scheme before exploding in a torrent of cursing. "That... that... WHORE!." Under normal circumstances someone who called Kimiko that in her boyfriends presence would have been the target of a savage beating or had their entire life ruined. At that moment though Toshiro was fully occupied using his sisters distracted state to good use. Jabbing the blade of his katana into the ground , the tokubetsu jounin brought both hands together and used the fingers of his right to force the other unresponsive ones on his left to form the needed handseals. He couldn't say it hurt since by that point his entire left arm and shoulder was numb and stiff, but it didn't exactly feel pleasant either. No doubt it would really hurt when whatever numbing agent had been on those shuriken wore off, but right then such thoughts were for the future. The present was for taking this chance to complete the job he had started months ago. 'Tori, inu, saru, ushi.' Slower than he liked thanks to have to form what amounted to a full seal using one hand, Toshiro still managed to finish the technique before his sister recovered her wits and realized the nature of his plan. That plan started with the clones that had formed from the remnants of the snow-haired Hinamori's water dragon - one snatching the embedded sword and launching a fusillade of two-handed strikes at Asusha while the others attempted to grapple her. While individually they never would have lasted long, the sheer difference technique and their expendable nature meant that Asusha to had stay almost completely on the defensive to avoid being pinned and skewered.

A situation Toshiro sought to exploit to its fullest by using what was probably the most destructive combination of jutsu in his arsenal. It was also the only technique he knew that could not be evaded - the Shuriken Kage Bushin produced too much steel for that. Ignoring the protest of numb fingers the tokubestu jounin sent both hands into his smaller-than-normal equipment pouch and pulled double fistful of wrought-iron throwing stars, two between each finger. Ignoring the damage grabbing the weapons had put on his left hand, Toshiro snapped his arms forward, letting fly with all twelve weapons while his clones kept his sister's attention. Naturally one could hardly expect accuracy or any great speed given how the weapons had been thrown but the follow-up jutsu that had started as soon as his hands met took care of the later. "Reppushou" Blasted forward by the blast of wind the twelve shuriken went from barely deadly into something far more serious, and what followed that up made them outright deadly. "Shuriken Kage Bushin" Suddenly twelve became twelve hundred and each had the same speed as their original - making accuracy redundant and any speed gained from the initial throw pointless. In the face of such an onslaught the only way to escape was either a barrier hastily raised or just getting the heck out of the way - neither option being available to Asusha at that moment. Instead she found herself buried under three water clones in a very un-ninja like if highly effective dog pile just before the sheer quantity of steel tore through the mizu bushin then her flesh as well as the surrounding ground.

Looking down from where he stood over the puddles of water and mangled corpse, the figure had just reached down when "Asusha" abruptly turned into a hunk of rubble. Then two arms (one recently healed) snaked around and grabbed the figure in a chokehold as a mocking voice whispered in its ear. "Clever, but did you really think I could be caught like that? Good bye... brother." With that Asusha drew one chakra-encased hand across her victim’s throat to cut it from the inside. For a moment she reveled in having gotten rid of her brother and indirectly hurting the person who she blamed for her fall. Then the body collapsed into water and before Asusha could fully comprehend what was happening she felt a whole knew sensation... pain. Not the sort of pain that came from the non-lethal injuries or broken bones acquired in training, but the sharp radiating pain that good medic-nin know comes from major damage to internal organs. Not surprising since the wielder of the katana that had pierced the rogue Konoha-nin had aimed the blow to hit as many vital organs as possible. Entering from below the ribs on the right side the blade had pierced the liver and spleen before exiting through the opposite kidney - the sort of wound that is almost certainly fatal. The shock of alone of facing death (for the second time) was enough that Asusha barely even registered the hate-laced voice of her brother whispering in her ear. "Yes, this is good bye... and good riddance." Then the youngest of the four original siblings put an end to his sister in a manner that was as grisly as it was certain. A quarter-twist to the blade ripped larger holes in the damaged organs and put the blade parallel to the ground then Toshiro pulled the hilt toward him - causing the blade to slice outward like some sort of gruesome bug emerging from the corpse it had been raised in.

Sure that this time nothing could save her, Toshiro used his still-numb arm to give his sibling a hard shove that sent her sprawling face-down on the dirt then brought one foot down on her back (right over the damaged kidney) to pin her. Then he squatted down and drove the final nail in the coffin of whatever hope Asusha might have had for forgiveness as the proverbial light in her eyes started to fade. "Water clones are a useful thing when they show someone what they want to see." At that point Toshiro stood up and went to pick up the blade stained with his own kin's blood. He had just done that, and doing his best to ignore absence of any real feeling (positive or negative) despite having just killed his own sister, when a sense of... wrongness came from behind him. Spinning around while brining his solitary blade up in a one-handed guard, Toshiro couldn't keep from putting his reaction to what was happening in front of him into words. "What the?!" Eloquent it was not, but it summed up his understanding of the situation pretty completely. One could hardly consider seeing some sort of... gash opening mid-air above the body of a dead sibling then closing with nothing left behind a daily occurrence.

It would take Toshiro several minutes to collect his wits and assure himself that what he had seen wasn't some sort of genjutsu or the work of some nearby confederate before coming to a decision. That being he needed help to figure out just what had happened and the best person he could think of for that help was out in the woods. Knowing that finding her trail in his current condition would take longer than waiting for her return, the snow-haired ninja half-staggered to the nearest upright wall before putting his back against it and letting gravity take over. Finally less uncomfortable as the ebbing adrenaline of battle made him acutely aware of the numerous abuses his body had taken, Toshiro found it increasingly difficult to stay aware and awake. No stranger to post-battle fatigue it didn't occur to the special jounin that maybe his sister's weapons had more than a numbing agent on them. His last thoughts before a blackness not entirely natural wiped all thought out being 'Just a few minutes. Then I'll go looking for Kimi,'

Toshiro: 119 CP - 55 = 64 CP

Spoiler:

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

Kimiko found herself becoming lost in her own thoughts once more, wrapped up in her own little world while she led the way to the location that Hishui had revealed to her earlier. As such, she was rather surprised when she felt a soft hand placed itself upon her shoulder. She gasped and whirled round, as if reaching for a concealed weapon that she knew she didn’t have about her person, only to be met with the kindly, weathered face of Sayuri. “Calm yourself, child. It is only an old lady sensing your inner turmoil.” The old lady chuckled to herself, her wise outlook not escaping the youth whom she had managed to surprise only seconds earlier. She would have asked how Sayuri knew of her thoughts, what she was thinking, but knew better than to ask. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to know, but she already had a good idea why. It wasn’t as if she hid her preoccupation with her thoughts, she knew that much. Everybody always had called her an open book when it came to her emotions and facial expressions, mainly because of her chocolate eyes more than anything, so she knew better than to assume there were reasons otherwise. “What is it that ails you?” Sayuri asked, moving to walk beside the Konoha Special Jounin. The latter female smiled slightly, turning and looking at the elderly woman beside her. “Nothing’s troubling me. I was just thinking, that’s all.” What she spoke of wasn’t a lie, it just hadn’t been the truth either. She didn’t want to express her concerns about her beloved Toshiro facing off his mentally unstable and unbelievably powerful sister alone, while she was here protecting the surviving villagers. But something told her that the old woman already knew; she was just trying to get the Katsumi to open up about it. “Share with me what was on your mind. It is good to share one’s inner feelings, whatever they be. They say that it stops us from going mad.” Something about the way Sayuri said that made the ebony-haired girl bite her lip, and consider saying as such.

What had been on her mind? She had been thinking about whether she had made the right choice in life, being a shinobi, that is. She was thinking about her boyfriend, fighting against his sibling even now, and wondering whether he was dead or alive. She was regretting not going back to aid him, to see him, if the worst was indeed the case. She gave a strong smile, the kind that she was so used to from her younger days, and shook her head. “I’m honestly fine, Sayuri-san.” Her voice was soft, and something about it made the older woman not press the issue any further. “My thinking won’t hinder my abilities in battle.” That was a promise that she wouldn’t break. Nothing could perturb her while she was fighting, not really. Only the one experience that she could remember had made her hesitate before fighting, and that was because of the nature of her opponents; the three powerful men who had nearly succeeded in killing her two years past. There had been whispers of the strange organisation’s return, and that was something she hoped was just rumour. Missing Nin passed around such rumours to make villages paranoid, and she would rather it be that than a true story. There was no way she could deal with that crowd again; that group of clinically insane, strong criminals that were so hell-bent on razing Konoha to the ground. Not yet.

They walked for what seemed like a lifetime, especially since they were not allowed to run in order to hasten proceedings. Sayuri was an old woman, and there were many injured or old in the company too. Kimiko wished now that she had been eligible to practise Eijutsu like her mother had in order to relieve the villager’s physical suffering, but she knew that the wounds were probably only secondary to the hurt and pain they felt from having their home destroyed. No Medic could heal the heart. She knew that first hand. The sunlight started to wane, even through the thick canopies of the trees spread out above them. ‘Goodness… how much time has really passed?’ The ebony-haired girl glanced up to the tree tops, trying to spot the sun in amongst the great green leaves and not being able to do so. Their little envoy reached the makeshift emergency shelter after what must have been quarter of an hour more of a trek, and she played the role of emergency medic which was saying something in itself. She was no medic, that much had been rubbed in her face often enough by her mother in her youth, but she knew how to bandage wounds and deal with basic things from her own mishaps in childhood. One might not think so to look at her now, but once upon a time she had been a huge tomboy, and would come back covered in cuts and bruises from numerous fights she would wage against other boys that she befriended. She used the small medical kit she kept in her bag to bandage cuts and scrapes on small children, giving them smiles and reassurances, telling them how brave they were. She did the same for those older too, minus the reassurances of them being brave as not to belittle them. The kids had been more than happy to show off their war wounds to one another, and spoke of how their ‘saviour’ had fixed them. It warmed her heart to see such actions and faith in her, she would not deny it, but her mind was still elsewhere. When she reached the oldest member of the party, Sayuri, she had a look on her face that spoke of knowing. A lot of knowledge about something specific; what was plaguing Kimiko’s thoughts.

The younger of the two females unrolled a section of bandage and wound it tightly around the elder’s forearm, where a small cut had been sustained; probably from rubble, or sharper plant life as they were herded into that makeshift compound by the mercenary men from before. Not a word was spoken between them, but a conversation was had with their eyes and facial expressions alone, and it seemed that Sayuri knew much more than she first cottoned on. She placed a hand on the Special Jounin’s shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze, giving an old, weary smile that still held all the warmth in it that a grandmother should have. Maybe she did have grandchildren, but Kimiko hadn’t asked. “I know you’ve made the right choice.” Seeing how those words shook the younger girl up, Sayuri chuckled and tapped a finger to her nose in a secretive manner, to show that she couldn’t share her secrets on the matter. After that, with all minor wounds treated (thankfully the wounds sustained by people were only small anyway), Kimiko packed away her medical kit and prepared herself to head back to the village where she would investigate what was going on.

Hishui and Funiki said their goodbyes, but she assured them it wouldn’t be for long. She said that she would be back soon in order to tell the villagers whether it was safe to return yet or not, and with those parting words, she set off back in the village’s direction. She shrugged her rucksack better onto her back and set off at a run; her body feeling much freer now that she had allowed it freedom of movement. It seemed like forever since she had really ran for something, and now she knew what she was running for. She was going to find Toshiro and help him, no matter what the cost. She dug deep and reached the village quickly, panting slightly when she reached the outskirts. She slowed her pace down to a walk to catch her breath, moving gingerly through the scorched buildings. She looked this way and that cautiously, eyes flickering and trying to take in all her surroundings at once, just in case of any lurking danger. She reached a space where a building should have been, currently a burnt wreckage at her feet. “Toshiro!” She shouted into the empty village, cupping her hands around her mouth for her voice to carry further. But the only sound she heard was her own voice echoing back at her. She frowned, concern welling up deep inside her very being as she moved quicker through the village, losing all care for her attire while doing so. Ashes stained her white sun dress and the wreckage ripped at her sandals to reach her feet, but she seemed oblivious to such things.

She finally reached the village’s ‘centre’ as it once would have been called, but now nothing much remained of the place. A large house-like building had been absolutely desonated, and around it was a large pool of… water? Her heart leaped and she grew hopefully, sprinting across the village square to inspect what remained of the house, but instead her attention was drawn to the barely upright wall opposite. Because of her earlier angle of approach, she hadn’t seen who sat slumped on floor, but now that she was able to see the white-haired male, she gasped aloud in shock. “Toshiro…” She muttered, not quite believing that it was him at first. It must be someone else. It just had to be! Asusha was nowhere to be seen, and she started to assume the worst. Her breath started to catch in her throat, and she threw aside her heavy rucksack as she skidded to her knees and placed both hands on Toshiro’s shoulders. “Come on, wake up!” She cried out stubbornly, not wanting to believe the worst could have happened. All signs pointed to that fact, due to Asusha not being in the area dead or dying. Instead… it had been the opposite way round. She placed two fingers to her boyfriend’s exposed neck and felt a pulse, so she stopped worrying so much knowing that he was alive. “Toshiro, I’m here, I’m back! I know who did this to you and wherever she is, I’ll find her and kill her.” She wrapped her arms around her beloved, forcing her body against his as if she was trying to transfer her heartbeat to him, to make him awaken from whatever state he was in. She chewed on her lip anxiously, pressing her mouth to his ear and whispering, “I love you”, words spoken straight from the depths of her heart.

It was then that she noticed the cuts on Toshiro’s clothing at his shoulder. She wished that he would forgive her before grabbing the ends with both hands and pulling the fabric apart to expose the struck shoulder. She didn’t see a deep wound, only small ‘nick’ kinds of marks probably made from projectile weapons. But she remembered that Asusha was a specialist in poison. Maybe that kind of poison had entered Toshiro’s bloodstream, knocking him unconscious, or, or… slowly killing him.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Utterly unaware of that Kimiko was on the verge of a panic attack, Toshiro "awoke" from the all-encompassing blackness to an almost featureless space. In fact the only thing he was aware of beyond himself was ankle-deep water and a heavy fog that limited visibility to just past the reach of his arm. Completely lost, if that term could be applied to inside ones head, after turning a full circle and finding absolutely nothing to point to any direction as being a better choice the snow-haired clan heir abruptly starting walking forward. In his current situation, and based on the bits and pieces he remembered about mindscapes (if this was one and not just an elaborate hallucination), one direction seemed as good as any other. Without any references Toshiro had no idea how long (if time had any meaning where he was) he had walked in that mist beyond the number of questions he asked himself. The last of those questions being 'how did I get here and where is here?" Since was certain of being completely alone, the question had been completely rhetorical and as such the thing he least expected was a response. Much less one that boomed from all directions in a voice that wasn't quite normal. "If you're going to ask questions you already know the answer to, can you at least make them meaningful ones?"

Toshiro had been so wrapped in his own thoughts that he almost dismissed the "voice", only spinning around in a wheel kick as the tail end of that remark registered. Hitting nothing but fog, obviously, that motion ended with the snow-haired ninja crouched low with one of his usual blades in each hand. Eyes restlessly flickering about he tried to locate something, anything, in the mist that might tell him where the source of that voice was located. "Oh please. As if you could find me unless I wanted you to." Privately, as much as it galled him to admit it, that smug voice was right - in this fog he could hardly see or hear himself, much less find whoever had invaded his head. It took just moments for Toshiro to come up with a tried-and-true solution. 'If I can't go to them, get them to come to me. To that end the ninja raised his voice and put as much of a condescending tone to his next words as was humanely possible. "So you're a base coward and too weak to be a real threat?" His barb fired, the special jounin waited for the... whatever it was to respond with the expected anger. "Oh nice one. Maybe if I was a psychopathic kunochi when an unhealthy familial obsession I would actually be irritated at that." Of all the responses that could have been made, that was among the last Toshiro expected and the last one he wanted to hear. Not only had the... thing not taken the bait and started to get angry, whatever it was had turned his taunt around! Showing just how quickly he was getting annoyed with this unknown entity inside his head, a tic had formed over his right eye and was picking up speed.

At the same time Toshiro was learning that annoying smart-mouths dwelt even inside his own head, outside matters were taking a different course. By sheer luck (good or bad was yet to be determined) one of the Hinamori's patrols had stumbled across the survivors Kimiko had liberated. That meeting had resulted in two of that patrols five members towards the town that was their base for reinforcements and the other three towards the devastated village. Once there the squad leader had quickly assessed the situation from one of the intact rooftops, silently directing the team's medic to deal with situation below while the remaining two scouted the rest of the village and formed a perimeter. As soon as the order was given, the medic seemed to vanish and reappeared kneeling next to Kimiko with his hands taking over examining the likely entrance point for whatever poison was involved. The only indication that the clan ninja realized that he was treating his future clan head was how his eyes widened on seeing the crest pinned like always to Toshiro's collar, the rest of his manner being as close to purely professional as could be expected for the situation. "What happened and when?"

Toshiro: 119 CP - 55 = 64 CP

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

At times like these, Kimiko really wished that she was a Medical Ninja. But her chakra type had been the exact opposite of what a medic should use, and thus it was literally impossible for her to know much about the art of healing. She knew basic first aid from her own childhood mishaps, but nothing in much detail exactly. Poison was something that was entirely new to her; she had never dealt with it before, and didn’t even know where to start when considering it as a possibility. She was in such a state that she didn’t even notice the presence of anybody else in the area, and when somebody dropped down to her side to examine Toshiro, she literally fell backwards onto the ground from her earlier crouched position. Her chocolate eyes looked at the stranger, not recognising him whatsoever, but it seemed like he knew his patient rather well after eying the crest pinned at the collar. The man examined the small puncture-esque wounds inflicted on Toshiro’s shoulder, and without turning away from his current task, he asked the Katsumi what had happened and when it had transpired. She was really unable to help here, because even she didn’t know. She had been wrapped up in her own job of saving the survivors from the men who had held them captive, and anything that may have happened here wasn’t something she knew of. “Um…” She muttered, trying to think of something to say that would be useful to the situation. “I’m not… entirely sure. I’ve only recently arrived here because I was elsewhere liberating the captured townspeople. He was unconscious when I found him, and I’m not sure how long for. All I know is that he was in… an intense fight.”

She didn’t want to say who the perpetrator was for this fight just in case; it somehow seemed a little wrong. What she couldn’t quite understand is how she was trusting this stranger with the care of her boyfriend. But she felt as if this man knew what he was doing, and he wasn’t a threat to them. Knowing the sheer numbers that the Hinamori family seemed to sport, it wouldn’t surprise her if this man was one of that brood.

She watched the strange man curiously, her eyes holding a hint of suspicion as she crawled closer, almost in a protective manner as she faced the stranger. “Who are you? And how did you know where we were?” Her voice demanded answers; that was one thing that the stranger would most certainly realise. There was no point hiding the truth from Kimiko, and if he wouldn’t answer then he would be guilty in her books, that much was for certain. If she was to trust this man with the medical care of her boyfriend, the young man she would be lost without, she needed to know such details for her to trust him. It was common sense, and many others would follow the same pursuit. Perhaps not in such a… demanding, almost violent way that she had presented the questions earlier. Well, maybe it was an endearing thing, that she was so protective over the man she loved that she would be prepared to beat the living hell out of anybody who tried to touch him otherwise. She watched the stranger carefully, her gaze one holding great scrutiny while she looked him up and down a few times as if searching for some kind of identification that would prove who he was. For those in the Hinamori clan, they wore special pins, one of which even she had that Toshiro had given her before she left Konoha all those years ago. She had never really questioned why her boyfriend had another pin exactly the same; maybe it was a re-make, or the original pin and hers was one that matched his due to the fact that they were an ‘item’, or something. She honestly didn’t know, but maybe she would ask when Toshiro was awake and not suffering from poisoning.

The village was silent and un-moving, and she was under the impression that the three of them were alone in the place, but she wasn’t aware of two other men patrolling the village to piece together what had happened. They didn’t matter, however; what mattered was staying by Toshiro’s side until he woke up again.

{OOC: Bleh, this was such a short post, but I ran out of things to write.}

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Had he been aware of what was going on around his body, Toshiro would certainly have pointed out that it was the boyfriend's responsibility to be the overly-protective half of a pair. Not to mention that he was supposed to be the paranoid and suspicious one around unknown people - even if he found her sudden bout of protectiveness endearing. It's entirely likely he would have also comment that the medic didn't have to poke and prod the area that had gotten sliced so bloody hard. Since he wasn't aware of anything then (later would probably be a different tale, he would only find out about Kimiko acting like a lioness with a sick cub much later if one of the two talked. At that moment the only one talking was Kimiko herself as the medic seemed entirely focused on his patient. In particular the various methods by which he assessed that patients condition, among which was counted a rather ungentle handling of the affected area to check responsiveness and lifting one eyelid to see if the snow-haired ninja was unconscious or simply deeply asleep. Whatever conclusions about the exact cause of Toshiro's current situation the unnamed medic reached he kept to himself, opting to ignore Kimiko's questions or answer them tersely while going about repairing the damage to the snow-haired ninja propped up against a wall. "You can thank the villagers you rescued for my squad showing up. And for not being knocked out since they put you on the right side of whatever happened here." Hands glowing the pale green of medical chakra by that point were over the area where the drug had entered Toshiro's body, the medic's face scrunched up in concentration. Then slowly but with growing speed a watery translucent substance was drawn out of the small cuts before falling to the ground. "There. He should recover soon since it was only an overdose of a sedative." An application of a follow-up jutsu has the wounds visibly closing even as the medic stood up and began looking around. Whether for a source of danger just noticed or his squad mates he didn't say, instead visibly releasing pent-up tension before looking down at the young woman. "As to who I am - you don't need to know. Call me Tora if you must, but even that pin you wear has its limits."

While events were taking a positive turn outside his mind, inside Toshiro was finding himself in a situation he was not familiar with. Namely one where the other party not only held all the cards but had hidden the room too. After what seemed like hours of trading insults while trying to find whoever the voice inside his head was had only proven their boast correct, the tokubetsu jounin had resorted to a different approach. One that consisted of walking away while doing his utmost to ignore the annoying smart-mouthed voice. The later proving easier said than done - never once did that annoying voice show a hint of concern or urgency no matter what direction or pace was set. Unable to find and confront whatever it was behind that voice or draw it into the open, Toshiro eventually resorted to something he disliked doing with an adversary - bargaining. "Okay. Its obvious you want something, so spill it and we can come to some sort of deal." Head cocked as he listened for a response which seemed to take forever to come, raising his hopes of a toehold. Only to have them driven back into the sea of frustration. [color:7c84= ]"Oh how... droll. Now why would I do something silly like that when I hold all the advantages?" At that point Toshiro wasn't sure if he wanted to cry in frustration or destroy something. Then the source of that snide voice made its biggest mistake. The longer you're in here the easier my goals become... and the more that precious female of yours worries." For a moment the being probably thought it had struck pay dirt as Toshiro's expression showed open fear for the first time. Then the snow-haired ninja's expression morphed into something else - rage. To threaten his person was one thing- as a ninja and future clan head such threats were part of daily life at times. For this craven coward that hide in the mists inside his own mind to threaten someone close to Toshiro... well it didn't step over the line. It jumped over it and dared the other guy to do something about it.

Out in the "real world" that was playing with fire given Toshiro's tendency to react to threats by... neutralizing the person making them. Inside his mind the rules were more flexible, rousing his ire was akin to suicide. In this case suicide by storm as out of nowhere wind came howling, laced with stinging droplets of mist and whipping the water (which was getting deeper by the second) into waist-high waves that showed no signs of slowing their growth. Surrounded by the representation of his raw fury at this... things presumption to threaten his Kimiko and with blood pounding, Toshiro took no note of a sibilant whisper from somewhere in the maelstrom. "Yesss, you will be the one."

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

It seemed that this Medic was as tight-lipped as she had originally assumed him to be. Just something about the way he conducted himself made it clear to Kimiko that he wasn’t one for talking, much to her distaste. Perhaps it was the fact that she was deemed to talk too much, but she never had been drawn to those who point-blank refused to speak. But she would let it slide because this stranger was healing Toshiro. She knelt beside him, clasping one of his hands in both of hers, currently solid chocolate gaze never leaving the still face of her beloved for even a second while the silence enveloped their little party of three (more like two since one wasn’t conscious). She raised her eyes briefly to see the stranger roughly handling the wounded shoulder on the snow-haired Konoha Nin, and shot him a warning glance before he finished poking and prodding about. Finally, the stranger spoke up after goodness knows how long of remaining quiet. He told her that his squad had found the villagers and were told of their whereabouts within the village, or rather, the fact that there was somebody in the village that had gone to inspect it. He also pointed out that Kimiko was rather lucky for being trusted by the villagers and not deemed to be one of the perpetrators, and she wasn’t quite sure whether this stranger was condemning her as a possible suspect for what originally happened, or disregarding her in a strange, round-about way. He then continued to work on his medical jutsu, finally extracting a thin, watery liquid from the small marks on Toshiro’s shoulder and letting the droplets fall to the ground. He said that the clan heir would soon awaken because (thankfully) it wasn’t a poison, and instead an overdose of sedative. That was rather odd. Asusha would use poison to kill Toshiro, the brother she had disowned after fleeing the village. Instead, she had used a sedative-drenched weapon? Maybe she wanted him to stay alive longer. With the rogue nin nowhere to be seen or found, however, it was hard to assume such things.

The stranger said that his name was classified information, in short, but said that if she must, she could call him Tora. This ‘Tora’ character went on to say that the pin she wore at her left breast had its limits… and that was when it hit her. The man’s earlier reaction to seeing Toshiro unconscious. The fact that he had been in the area so soon after the incident. And now he had recognised the Hinamori crest, giving direct reference to it. That was something only a Hinamori clan member would do. She gave him a sideways glance of curiosity, keeping Toshiro’s hand locked between hers. “So you’re one of his kin.” It would have been a question if she had any doubt in her mind, but she most certainly didn’t. Not since all of the pieces fitted quite nicely together. There was no need to speak her beloved’s name; it was well-known throughout the Hinamori ranks since he was the clan’s heir, after all. And if their relationship continued, and developed those few steps further, she would become the clan’s matriarch figure like Momo was at present. The thought was a strange one, but as of late Kimiko had continued to mull it over in her mind. After wanting to be part of a clan for so long she had found that, technically, she was part of one all along. The Katsumi brood were a clan in their own right for their shinobi prowess and history. If she married into the Hinamori clan, she would be of a clan then as well. It was an… interesting thought. There would come a lot of duty, as Momo kept insinuating in the meetings that they attended together in the Hinamori household. It had been Momo’s wish that her ‘new daughter’ came round often to hear of lessons, tidbits of information and other such useful things. Her boyfriend’s mother was rather determined that their relationship would progress to the point of marriage, and that in itself was a kind of daunting thing.

If this Tora knew of Toshiro, chances are that he also knew of Kimiko. Her identity had been spread throughout the clan after her encounter with one of her beloved’s uncles, and she had gained quite a few supporters, and enemies. Asusha had been one of the fiercest of these enemies. For some reason she didn’t like the idea of a clanless female marrying into the clan, or she had some kind of strange grudge that Kimiko just couldn’t understand. It was most certainly a confusing situation that was hard to explain, and it wasn’t spoken of outside of a trusted few individuals. It had been touch-and-go about whether she could tell her father of the true nature of why Aya had been taken that day two years ago, but he had been told provided that he didn’t share the information with anybody else. Her father had been making an effort with getting to know his daughter’s prospective in-laws, and he had already been acquainted with Momo because of his wife’s friendship with her all of those years ago.

The Katsumi female was none the wiser to what was going on inside Toshiro’s mind, and instead focused on him waiting for the time that he would awaken. “Thank you.” She said without looking up from her boyfriend’s motionless face, obviously speaking to the strange Medical Ninja that had come to her aid. Tora had helped Toshiro, and for that she felt forever indebted to him. “I’m not so cagey with my name, so I’ll tell you mine. I’m Katsumi Kimiko. I don’t particularly care for what you’ve already heard about me if you are of Toshiro’s kin, but I’m thankful for doing what I could not. Medical care was never my strongest suit, as you can probably tell.” Her scars were rather easy to see to anybody who cared to truly scrutinise her, and the ones most obvious to the stranger from his angle were those on the young woman’s right arm, faint and criss-crossing. At her upper left arm there was the characteristic starburst-shaped scar that had been caused by a ill-removed blade. She gladly told people she was even happy about that scar and its shape; it matched the Hinamori clan’s symbol, with it being a starburst in shape. Silence ensued between the pair once more while the Katsumi watched Toshiro with a soft shimmer in her chocolate orbs. Concern. Warmth. Care. There were never quite enough words to describe how she felt about this young man in particular, but those three most certainly echoed her feelings rather well at present. In many ways, she wished that she hadn’t gone to save the villagers so that she could have taken the brunt of Asusha’s damage instead of Toshiro. But she knew that he would not be best pleased about such a thing. The villagers seemed grateful for her assistance in freeing them and helping them, after all, and she could wish all she wanted for the harm to have come to her instead, but it would not change facts. At least Toshiro would be okay if she took the Medic’s word for it.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Inborn talent, the result of how she was raised, or even an emerging bloodline limit - if there was one thing Toshiro knew about Kimiko that never changed, it was how people reacted to her. He had yet to meet anyone, save those with the blackest of hearts, who could stay unmoved and remote from her. The medic who had treated Toshiro was no exception to that rule, his grim expression - the result of seeing more suffering in his thirty-odd years than many three times his age would - softening just a bit at Kimiko's thanks. In fact the medic had a daughter not too many years the Konoha-born kunochi's junior who said she wanted to be a ninja "like papa". He had tried to steer her to a different path, fearing how the reality of life as a shinobi would darken her outlook like it had that of other ninja (including himself), but with the usual determination of adolescence she persisted. Seeing Kimiko's open caring and kind nature first hand had renewed his hope that maybe, just maybe, his own little girl could be a ninja and not lose herself in the "shadow world" like so many others. Putting one hand on Kimiko's shoulder, "Tora's" expression as he looked down at the pair of Leaf-nin was almost approving. "You have no need for fear that I hold you ill will Katsumi-san. Even if you were only Toshiro-sama's comrade in arms your actions speak well of you." Whatever "Tora" might have said beyond that would remain unsaid as he looked at the closest roof where one of his comrades had appeared and was signing something. Whatever it was had the medic-nin nodding before signing something back with the hand not on Kimiko's shoulder before he spoke again. "I can see why you mean so much more than that to him though. Someday I hope to address you as Lady Hinamori." With that the clan ninja abruptly blurred from view and was gone in a demonstration that ANBU weren't the only ones to have a way to move faster than the eye could follow.

While that happening outside, inside his own mind Toshiro was in the proverbial eye of the storm. Initially waist high the waves now obscured him from sight and the howling of wind drowned out any sound. Behind that shield of violent water the young ninja was unnaturally still, as if utterly unaware of the tempest raging just beyond his hands. In a way he was unaware of that and more as he focused solely on getting a hold of the urge to just charge blindly into the mist while swinging until he hit something. As much as he wanted to give into that urge, Toshiro was sure that doing so in this case would be playing in the hands of whatever was out there. So it was no surprise he was only peripherally aware of the formation of several tendrils of water inside the protective wall. What should have made snow-haired ninja nervous was when the tendrils began moving towards him yet for some reason he couldn't fathom he was far from concerned. In truth the clinically detached part of his mind was actually curious and became more so when the tendrils started to twine around his unsheathed blades until the actual steel itself couldn't be seen. With the conscious part of his mind occupied leashing his temper, it fell to that clinically detached part to see just what could be done with these new toys.

Outside of the maelstrom the thing whose words had trigged all this was actually puzzled. It had prodded it's "home" in the hope of just this happening, but it had expected to have seen the final results by now. Another entity might have actually been concerned that their plans had gone wrong, but this one was nothing if not supremely confident in its plans. After all, it had done this countless times until just a short century ago as the humans reckoned time and it has never failed. It was however concerned that maybe it had overestimated this particular host's ability to cope with the "sink or swim" approach to learning this particular step and had gotten himself overwhelmed. It hoped not - finding someone with the right combination of skills and mindset was difficult at the best of times. Pondering the possibility that maybe it had made a... mistake, the being barely noted when the wall of violent moving water was abruptly broken not once but twice. Erupting from the water like two sharks ambushing a seal, twin masses of water compressed into crescent-shaded blades. Twins blades whose detonation on impact briefly exposed a scaly length of hide and a saurian snout scrunched up in what might have been pain. "Ouch. Such a painful reminder about underestimating beginners luck." Then the mist was back as the storms fury was spent, leaving one white-haired ninja panting heavily as the unknown speaker continued talking as if he hadn't just absorbed two deadly attacks. "It seems my task is done... for now. In time you will remember this but now you need to return to your mate." The last word had Toshiro looking up and about to say something when he caught sight of something out the corner of one eye. Whatever it was large, looked almost scaly, and just about to... whap, make that had, slammed into the side of his head.

The next sensation Toshiro was aware of was pain. The whole-body, hurts-even-on-the-inside sort of low-grade pain that was the bodies way of saying "hey moron, don't do that again". So it shouldn't be a surprise that the first thing out of his mouth summed that up. "Owww..."

[ooc: Finally. Lack of inspiration and motivation-draining work load made this take much much longer than I wanted.]

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

Unlike many trained in the arts of a shinobi, Kimiko had the ability to determine between an enemy’s touch and a comrade’s. As such, she didn’t so much as flinch when she felt a hand being placed upon her shoulder. Slowly, she turned around and looked up at the Medic Nin named Tora, feeling glad to see a small smile on the man’s face. It was true that Medical Ninja had the short end of the straw in many cases. They wielded the power to save human lives, and yet they also had the power to take those lives if mistakes were made. It was a difficult job, and sometimes, when she really thought about it, the Katsumi was very glad that she didn’t have the chakra affinity for Medical jutsu. Tora had a look about him that almost spoke of approval; it was hard to describe how it was hard to tell either way. He seemed happy that the young Special Jounin was there, and he seemed to… respect her. He spoke to her then, in a tone that was much more open than the one he had used earlier. He said that he had no reason to think ill of her, and hearing that in itself made the ebony-haired young woman smile. Tora was rather complimentary of her to say that he had been so cagey with her only moments earlier, but she wasn’t about to betray that sign of trust. “Thank you, Tora-san.” She told him, nodding her head firmly and fixing his gaze with her own warm chocolate one. He expressed an understanding for why Toshiro saw her as much more than a comrade in arms, and then… he wished that one day he would be able to address her as Lady Hinamori. Before she really had time to comprehend that, he was making some strange hand signs to a comrade of his up on a roof, and he was gone, leaving a crimson-faced Katsumi in his wake. “L-L-Lady…” She managed to stutter out loud to herself, holding a hand out in front of her eyes and pointing back at herself as if she could not quite believe what she had heard. “Hinamori?...” She murmured, letting go of Toshiro’s hand while she tried to comprehend this fact. It was entirely possible that she could end up marrying her boyfriend, but… goodness gracious! They were both eighteen years old, with Toshiro approaching his nineteenth too. Not of the age to marry, not really. It hadn’t even really been discussed by the pair of them, and people kept assuming that they would become married in the near future.

Not that she minded at all.

She placed a hand on her cheek, feeling the heat currently harboured there because of her current level of embarrassment. She lowered her eyes to look at her currently unconscious beloved significant other, possible material for a husband in the years of their life to come. Her thoughts from before returned to her, the conflict she had reached about being a shinobi. She thought that she had resolved that conflict before, but alas not. All she could think of while she looked at Toshiro was the possibility of him not waking up, or her being in his place at present. She had a scrape with death already in her young life, too close for comfort. And yet she kept fighting. She had a young man that she was wholly considering spending the rest of her life with, and continued to go out every day risking her life for the good of her village and ultimately, the peace of the shinobi world. What was more important to her? That was the real question in hand. Her plan of action as always was to become stronger so that death couldn’t happen to her, and she would fight with all her will and power every day so that she would come back alive every time. But all she needed was a slip-up, one tiny failure, and that would be her life extinguished. A depressing, harrowing thought if ever there was one, but… an entirely valid one. Suddenly, her eyes saddened and she lowered her hand from her cheek into her lap, clasping both appendages together tightly. Her face blanched at this realisation. Why was she thinking about this now of all times? Surely she should discuss this beforehand with her family, with Toshiro and his family too. She should allow herself to really think this through before considering an aspect so considerably, and yet here she was actually thinking about handing in her shinobi headband and retiring… so young.

If she would be able to see the faces of all those she loved and not worry about dying, it would be worth it though, right? She grasped hold of her head with both hands, biting her lip so hard that she drew blood while trying to puzzle it all out. Her only real ambition in life was to become a hero, a shining light to all those she met and the world itself. Having the capacity to see darkness in people, she wished to stop that darkness from growing and spreading and corrupting the world further. What Asusha had done today alone proved that the shinobi world was already out of control and needed peace to recover from its wounds. The number of people that lost the lives of their loved ones through attacks of this calibre alone, and in retrospect, this was nothing compared to what war did. And yet, even though their world was not at war, people still died every second of every day. For what? Money? Power? The reasons differed from person to person, and yet it continued to happen. Without the push in the right direction that mankind needed, the next war that happened would bring absolute devastation; leaving nothing and achieving nothing. Such was the flashpoint of the human race. Kimiko fixed her eyes on the ground, taking a deep breath and trying to clear her head. Toshiro would wake up at any moment, and she should focus on him instead of allowing her thoughts to run wild without reason. Although today’s events were small and could even be considered insignificant, they had made her rethink her life and left her in a muddle as to what she should do, and for what reasons.

Thankfully, she was roused from her thoughts just as her significant other chose to voice the fact that he was awake. He grumbled a rather heart-felt ‘ow’, and she snapped her attention straight to him with a smile now bright on her face. She lowered her hands from her head and grasped her boyfriend in a warm embrace. “Toshi-kun!” She cooed delightfully in his ear, holding him tighter and tighter without quite realising that there may be side-effects to the fact that he was injured. Slowly, she released her grip and giggled sheepishly at her mistake. “Are you alright?” She asked, concern evident in her voice. She tenderly placed a hand on his forehead, testing his temperature and smoothing his white locks back from his face. The relief that flooded through her chocolate brown orbs was immense, it was clear to see, and she felt happy that Toshiro was awake once more in spite of earlier injuries he was subjected to.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Feeling as if he had been used as a punching bag by every taijutsu-obsessed nutcase in Konoha, it took Toshiro a bit of time before other sensations breached that overwhelming ache. The first was warmth was familiar but different from that of the sun beating down. A warmth that was concentrated around his upper body where some of the worst aches were, taking the edge off the pain. Then that wrath that abruptly was removed - an action that brought an unconscious pout to the tokubetsu jounin's mouth. Before he could mutter something about it not being fair another spot of warmth appeared on his forehead and what sounded like someone calling his name. As much he wanted to stay where he was in the hope that the warmth would come back, it was becoming apparent that he would have to return to the land of the wakeful. So with a quite grunt of exertion the snow-haired ninja got one hand to obey his will and push him somewhat upright. Maybe it was some li6ngering trace of the drug still in his system or his brush with something that was already becoming less than a vague flash of memory, but when Toshiro opened his eyes almost everything was out of focus. Dead center in that blurry panorama was a vision that Toshiro could only describe as angelic. Still not completely awake, Toshiro wasn't aware that he spoke his next thought out loud. "This can't be the afterlife. Angles don't live in hell." Clearly not believing what his eyes were seeing, the special jounin closed them and counted to ten before opening them again. This time the blurriness had abated enough that he could recognize some details.

Among those details was the person kneeling in front of him. "Kimi-chan?" As much statement of relief as verification that he wasn't seeing things. If Kimiko was here, Toshiro reasoned, then she had escaped injury and that was a massive weight off his shoulders. A good thing because he now had another one to carry. A burden whose mark was splattered not only over his sleeve but scored into his soul and smeared over the sword that even in unconsciousness he had refused to relinquish. An action that was becoming easier to contemplate at the thought of what he had done with that blade. Yes Asusha had done things that were beyond forgiving, the worst of them in trying to turn Kimiko's little sister into a "power of human sacrifice", but she had still been his sister. The sibling who had dragged him on "adventures" around compound and village, the big sister who he had first shed blood for (her first ex-boyfriends nose had bled profusely). As much as the snowy special jounin wished otherwise, bonds like that are almost impossible to fully break. Without a battle-high or a cold rage from a very recent atrocity to bury everything else the full weight of what he had done and what it mean he was came crashing down. Kin-slayer. An ugly term to describe an ugly act and now it would be applied (regardless of justification) to himself. At least by the harshest critics and chief among those was his own conscience. The thing that truly terrified Toshiro however was that he found didn't care what others thought.

While he had never been one to change to please others (save a tiny handful of people) he was human and the fear of being ostracized for something was as much a part of him as every other human. Yet Toshiro couldn't muster an ounce of concern for the possibility that others would think less of him for killing his own sibling. Not because Asusha had betrayed their clan and the village. It wasn't even that Asusha had shown no remorse when she thought she had killed him or the damage done (and lives taken) in her attack on this village. In a moment of absolute clarity and honesty with himself the snow-haired special jounin knew exactly why, if given a second chance, he would still do exactly as he had done. Because Asusha had once threatened Kimiko. That scared him to the core of his very being because it meant he would do more than kill for the young woman in front of him - he would literally do anything for her.

Even bury how scared he was so as to not add to the burdens Kimiko was already shouldering. Burying it to the point that all he said about what had happened before was short to the point of cryptic. "Its over. She's gone for good."

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

The ebony-haired female was aware that Toshiro wasn’t entirely with it in the way he opened his bright turquoise eyes. They didn’t seem focused, and that was to be expected. She waited patiently, hands clasped on his shoulders still leant over him with concern etched deep on her face. He murmured something out loud that probably should have been for his thoughts alone, about how this couldn’t be the afterlife because angels didn’t live in hell. He was talking about her. She blinked wide-eyed and withdrew a hand to place it on her cheek, feeling how her face was flushing already. Even though she knew the statement had not been said with Toshiro in the soundest of minds, it still managed to make her blush at the compliment. “This better not be the afterlife. We’re too young and pretty to die yet.” She teased, ruffling her better half’s snow-white hair playfully. Die… to die… dying… she could do that, and so could Toshiro. The one person aside from her own flesh and blood that she would do anything for, no matter what the consequence. He seemed to finally come around after closing and re-opening his eyes, at which point he spoke her name as a question, to see if he was still delirious or not, she guessed. Kimiko smiled at him and nodded her head, gently pushing her long black locks from her face behind her ear. “The very same.” Her voice held relief and cheer within its tone; such was her happiness that Toshiro was awake now.

He fell silent soon after, however, and appeared deep in thought about something or other. He looked off into the distance and it made her wonder what he was thinking about, only to contradict herself and sigh at her stupidity. He had just woken up after being knocked unconscious in a fight with his traitorous sister, so he would of course be reflecting on that fight, would he not? It seemed to make sense in the Katsumi’s mind at least. He truly did seem troubled about something, but Kimiko sat in silence and waited patiently for him to tell her himself rather than probing too deep into fresh wounds. She knew her boyfriend well, well enough to realise when he needed time to brood and think on things. If it were anybody else, she would be asking no end of questions to find out what was bothering the person, but because it was Toshiro, the rules of the game changed completely. After what seemed like an eternity of silence between the pair, with the ebony-haired girl letting her beloved think about whatever was on his mind for however long he needed, Toshiro eventually broke the quietness. Even then, his answer was very matter-of-fact and to the point. He said that it was over and that ‘she’ was gone for good. ‘She’ was most definitely Asusha; it made sense, after all, since he had fought her only a few hours ago, if that. The Katsumi nodded slowly, biting her lip and turning to observe the area around the pair of them for any signs of a body. There was none. She had noticed that when she first arrived to find Toshiro unconscious, and had assumed that Asusha had gotten away.

If she was dead… where was her body? It was a macabre thought and very un-necessary given the fact that her boyfriend had just dealt with killing his own flesh and blood, his own sister, so she dismissed it for now. Without saying a word, her eyes spoke all that she needed to say. They told Toshiro that although it was painful, he had ultimately done the right thing. They said that Asusha would not have been stopped, and they also said that he should have allowed the Katsumi to help in the fight as opposed to sending her away to aid those in need. But above all, they spoke of empathy even though she had never had to commit such an act as killing her own sibling. By blood, she had none. She couldn’t even begin to understand the pain of severing a bond like that, and yet it seemed like she could empathise.

She pushed back on her feet from her couching position, pushing herself up to the balls of her feet. She reached out both her hands to take those belonging to Toshiro and aim to pull him up to stand slowly. “What is it you’re thinking?” She asked softly, eyes boring into her boyfriend’s as if in an attempt to search his soul. She knew that something was bothering him, and it was her duty to find out what it was. “We made a promise, remember?” She reminded him, thinking back to that day on their first mission together when they were mere children. Back in that cave, for the first time in her life, she had truly felt alive. And it was because she was with him. The one she always wanted to be beside no matter what the circumstance. She knew then what her heart was trying to make sense of before. In order to stay beside Toshiro, she had to keep getting stronger, and to keep getting stronger… she had to keep fighting, and she had to keep winning. “We lean on each other. Tell me what’s on your mind. I may not be able to help, but I’ll try my best.” She squeezed his hands tight between her smaller, softer hands, a small smile touching her lips as she looked up at him. She knew that it had something to do with Asusha; it had to be, especially given the fact that he had killed her and that thought was fresh in her mind. Kimiko assumed that Toshiro was struggling over the fact that he had killed his own kin, but of course she didn’t know that for certain. It might be something else entirely, or nothing at all. She was fairly certain of it not being the latter point because she knew Toshiro well enough to know when he had something on his mind, and he most certainly did right now. Whatever it might be, she was determined to find out because it would mean lifting a weight from both Toshiro’s mind, and hers. She didn’t like the thought of him having to struggle with terrible matters by himself, and she was always here for him for this reason. Before they had been together, the Hinamori heir was always particularly closed and secretive about most things; such was his personality. He wasn’t such an open book as Kimiko was, for example, and preferred to keep things to himself. Since getting to know him as well as she did, the Katsumi could tell what Toshiro was thinking or feeling from a single glance alone. They shared everything and kept nothing from each other, that was how much they trusted in one another. If ever her beloved tried to keep something from her, all she had to do was point out the promise they made to one another and his problems would be halved as he shared them with her. If he cared to ask her what was on her mind, she would tell him. She had learnt not to keep things bottled up inside for fear of them becoming overwhelming.

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Feeling as tired as if he had fought in a running battle for three days, Toshiro hadn't even tried to stand. Doing so would have only resulted in his embarrassing himself by toppling over so he had remained propped up against the wall. Not that he thought Kimiko would let him move until she was positive he was fit to do so - mentally as well as physically. The former having been obvious as her foremost concern if he was reading the way two brown eyes looked as if they were probing into his soul while offering the sort of understanding & acceptance that even his siblings couldn't offer. Then Kimiko went for the finishing blow by reminding him that it hadn't been a one-sided promise given in that cave so many years ago. For a moment Toshiro wondered if his girlfriend had been learning interrogation from his middle sister, then his more sensible side stepped. That side pointed out that Kimiko just had a good memory that never seemed to forget some things. Including promises made even years back and even the promise which had started the whole relationship between them. Another person might have still tried to deny anything being wrong. After nearly two years of being an "item" Toshiro knew better. Kimiko had proven that he simply could not keep (most) secrets from her if she really wanted to know. Especially not if she suspected that the secret was a bad one.

To be exact two things were on his mind at that moment. One being how he could keep what he had done from poisoning the relationship he had with Kimiko. She might not hold the act of killing his sister against him but there were others that would. Either out of a true "family always comes first" that allowed no exception, or (more likely) as part of some plot to gain more power for themselves or their clans. Some of those would be highly placed within Konoha and would have no qualms using this against the snow-haired ninja. If not directly then, and this bothered more, by twisting things around until it would damage Kimiko's chance to become Hokage. It was asinine and insane, but that was the nature of Konoha's politics where the poisoned blade of other power struggles was replaced with poisoned words. "How could I forgot. I still owe you a spanking for being reckless." For a moment the white-maned shinobi looked away with unseeing eyes in the general direction of Konoha as if trying to foresee the reactions to had happened in this small village. Then he turned back and the hand not holding his bloody blade reached out to enfold Kimiko's. A small gesture but it was the special jounin's way of saying he was truly worried about something. "It's the usual Kimi. Stupid small-minded people twisting things around to make one of us look bad out of spite." Then Toshiro's eyes moved from looking directly into Kimiko's to fix a hard glare at a patch of earth. It was a place where the only physical evidence (save that on Toshiro's weapon) of what had transpired could be found. Exactly where Asusha had landed against the ground was a patch of bare earth stained the rusty-red of dry blood. A patch that seemed to be missing about a third of the area it should have occupied as if the blood had stopped at an invisible line. "You saw the other problem. Or rather didn't see it which is the problem. No body."

"I don't know how but something literally ripped a gash in the air and swallowed her up as I was turning away."

Age : 29 Posts : 3640

Typical Toshiro. He had just been in a difficult fight with his older sister, most probably killed her, and he still managed to joke about the promise they made all those years ago. Was it five? Or six now? Sometimes Kimiko lost count, even though she was the female in the relationship and was supposed to remember important dates. She looked at him in a way that showed her amusement at his statement, but held undertones of, ‘Now seriously, there’s a time and a place for that’ in the gaze. “Not anymore, especially not since I haven’t gotten myself into much trouble since then… not all the time.” She hesitated as she remembered the time that she had fallen into coma from fighting two Missing Nin in Kumogakure, but hopefully it wouldn’t be brought up. It wasn’t important right now. Her beloved stopped speaking and glanced away, looking in the direction they had come from, where Konohagakure would be. Their home. When he turned back to face her, he reached out and folded his hand around hers. She looked at their entwined fingers soundlessly, chewing the bottom of her lip while she worked it over in her mind. That gesture… couldn’t be particularly good. She slowly raised her eyes, shadowed slightly by the long ebony bangs that framed her face, and stared into her partner’s own mixture of cerulean blue and green orbs. She would have taken note of how his eye colour had started to change with the older he got, but disregarded that fact for now. There were more pressing matters at hand, namely how he had basically told her without words that something was truly troubling his mind. He spoke then, saying how it was nothing more than the usual. In the past both of them had been subjected to ‘bad press’, where spiteful clans had not overly thrilled by their relationship and decided to spread bad rumours just to get back at them. None of that bothered the two Special Jounin, not really, but if harmful enough… the rumours could be believed and passed onto the wrong people.

Toshiro averted his gaze to look at a patch of earth not far away from where they were both stood (well, where one was stood and the other was leaning on the wall), glaring at it so intensely that it made the Katsumi shudder slightly just watching his line of sight. He addressed the fact that there was one large problem in their complex equation; there was no sign of Asusha’s body. She guessed that the spot with reddish brown stains, the colour of dried blood, was where the body was laid. The Hinamori heir continued to say that after felling his sister, a strange gash appeared in the air above the young woman and disappeared along with her. How strange… anybody else would have probably slapped some sense into the probably delusional Toshiro, but Kimiko knew better than that. She had a gut feeling that something strange had transpired here, and somehow she wasn’t particularly surprised that some kind of strange entity had whisked Asusha’s body away. That woman just couldn’t seem to die like any normal person, could she? The ebony-haired female sighed, a deep exhale of breath that rattled her whole body and seemed to make her deflate. A small smile tugged up at the corners of her lips as she looked back at her better half, giving him a nod to show that she understood and believed him. When it came to Toshiro’s older sister, something had never really been quite right. Many things passed through her mind when she thought about possibilities of such an entity being true. She had fought a strange organisation desiring the downfall of Konoha not long ago, and they admitted to having ties with Hinamori Asusha. Considering the strength of those three people that she fought back then, and the fact that she left two of them alive, meant that the evil Missing Nin might have had outside help in her strange escape. Takai was a Genjutsu expert, and it was a possibility that he used a strange Genjutsu to whisk Asusha away, or leave the impression of it while he or some other partner moved their comrade. There were many more explanations, all of which pointed to similar outcomes. It became clear that Asusha wasn’t alone in this exploit of hers, and that was a worrying factor.

There was a small thought niggling Kimiko, the fact that the bane of their existence wasn’t actually dead. There was a chance that she had been dying, and that strange gash in the air that whisked her away had done so in order to revive her and keep her from further harm. Whatever it was, she pushed it aside for now. All she was concerned about was the fact that she had her boyfriend, her Toshiro, and he was unharmed save for being exhausted after a hard battle. She placed her hands firmly on his shoulders, looking up slightly to meet his gaze all the while forcing him to look at her. “Toshiro.” Whenever she used his full name as opposed to the nickname she used so often, it became obvious that she was serious about something. “What’s important is that you’re safe. We’re both safe. What transpired here…” She trailed off, gazing at the ruined buildings with a small grimace. She cleared her throat and began to speak again, “it was a tragedy. But it’s not the end. Far from it. We need to… steel ourselves for more to come.”

It was clear by the way she was speaking that she was anticipating Asusha still being alive. It was a completely plausible fact (in a non-plausible way), especially since there was no body to speak of at the scene. The evil Missing Nin was a Medic, and if she had not quite been dead before being whisked away elsewhere, it’s a possibility that she could have healed herself wherever she was now. A terribly awful fact to comprehend, especially since Toshiro had fought hard to try and kill his own sister to now be faced with a possible truth of her still being alive. The ebony-haired Special Jounin removed her hands from her beloved’s shoulders, taking a step back to have a small breather as she felt everything catching up to her. It all seemed to make an impact at once. Why had she even considered quitting her shinobi career? With everything that had happened, it only reminded her how much she needed to keep fighting. If she gave up now, she would not only be letting herself down, she would be letting everybody else down too. Toshiro leaned on her, and so did a lot of other people. If she backed out of her dream for selfish reasons and decided to throw in the towel, she would be a coward and an oath-breaker. The fight against Asusha would be a long one, and she would need to be there to aid Toshiro in any way she could, no matter what the circumstances or how dangerous it became. That was what she had promised herself after the first incident with the psychotic maniac Toshiro had as one of his kin, and she was aware that nobody could do everything by themselves. She couldn’t, and her beloved couldn’t, no matter how strong they were, they relied on one another. She clenched a fist tightly and pressed it on her chest, above where her heart was beating rapidly and erratically. A vow of sorts… that would be what she made. What she would uphold. She tilted her head back and closed her large chocolate orbs as she faced the cloudy skies up above, unaware of the rain that began to fall slowly. It dripped down her face, soaked her hair and sullied her already ruined summery clothing. But she didn’t feel the cold. All she could feel was the beating of her heart, and the intensity of her promise. A new promise she was making. It was true what they said about he who hesitates is lost. No more hesitations from now on. She had said that she would become Hokage, she would be a shinobi to protect those she loved, and that would be what she would do. The risk of death should keep her on her toes, not prompt her to stop running and give up. These events reminded her of this fact, and the reality of it made her smile. It was small and almost undetectable, especially since she was looking up at the skies. She had barely noticed the clouds coming in, and the rain didn’t bother her.

She lowered her head once more, her eyes slowly opening and fixing themselves back on Toshiro. The small upward turns of her mouth gave away her smile as she stepped back towards him, hoping that he would understand what had just happened. If not, she could explain her earlier inner dilemma, but it was a dilemma no more. Not since she had renewed a vigour that constantly burned within her very being. “The people here are safe, and your kin have arrived to help them rebuild their village. That relieves us of the duty of watching over them, and we can continue with our own journey. A journey that we both know all too well.” She reached for his hand, the one that wasn’t holding his bloodied blade. She laced her fingers with his and raised their hands up, admiring how they went together so well as she briefly studied them before looking over the top of the entwined hands to meet his gaze. “This war of dragons that we keep fighting in… it’s only just beginning.”

{Exit}

Age : 49 Posts : 1036

Perhaps it was the irony of their relationship, but yet again Toshiro found himself leaning on the person who was supposed to lean on him. And not just physically as he (barely) managed to get to his feet but for the sort assurance that kept him from just throwing in the towel. In one of the ironies of life, the very things that Kimiko had been struggling with after liberating the villagers were now being confronted by Toshiro. He was, for lack of a better description, tired. While it was all but impossible to become a shinobi and not lose close people (those exceptions being the ones who died first), and Toshiro had already lost a few. Between that and the less-savory actions of certain members of the village eroding his loyalty to it as a whole, it too unusual for him to have begun questioning if he wanted to keep on being a ninja of Konoha. Just when that train of though might have started a series of events, it was derailed by one raven-haired kunochi’s words. Leave it to Kimiko, the girl the vast majority of his class had dismissed, to be the one to restore his commitment when it would otherwise have begun flagging.

It was with a silent chuckle that the snow-haired special jounin pushed himself off the wall and, with only a slight stumble, stood alongside Kimiko. Putting one arm around his girlfriend’s shoulder, Toshiro managed to steady himself enough to try walking towards where he had dropped his travel pack. "We best get moving then, empress of my heart. I don't think being out in this rain for long will do either of us any good." Then he did chuckle, even if the motions required made the world seem to swim just bit. ”I guess you’ll get that night out under the stars you wanted anyway.” That said the special jounin couldn’t keep his thoughts from flitting back to what had happened just scant hours before. With anyone else he would have discounted the possibility of their surviving the sort of injury he had inflicted. After what he had seen though Toshiro could only agree with Kimiko that things between themselves and his insane sibling were not yet finished. That Asusha had some unnatural means to escaping otherwise certain death had to be accepted - how else could she have escaped her demise years before. 'Someday nee-san. Someday your luck runs out and that day I'll be there." As he looked one last time at the spot where this feud should have ended but if he was to trust his instincts (and Kimiko’s) it had only entered a new phase before it was out of sight, he too made a silent vow. Next time there would be no trying to trick information out of Asusha, no seeking to answer the ultimate question of why she had thrown everything away. The next time brother and sister faced each other on the field of war; it would be for one purpose - to see the other dead at any cost.

It would only be years later Toshiro would find the missing piece that completed the puzzle of that day. Philosophers often talk about "balance" - how for everything there is an opposite. Light and dark, good and evil, yin versus yang and so forth. Well in sorting his grandfathers library after the old man had finally passed on, he would find that even kinjutsu are no exception. There among the piles scrolls that the duty of protecting would be his, Toshiro found one that described in detail the true nature of both the Silent Dragon and the existence of it's opposite which had no name. While the former was for taking life the later allowed one to cheat death itself - for a time and at a horrible price. The exact details of those requirements were too gruesome to bear repeating, but touched on nearly every reason a jutsu would become forbidden. In the simplest terms, when the user was on deaths door reality itself could be torn asunder and then rewoven such as that the user lived. Albeit with the memories of their "death", memories which would eventually drive the user insane. In the coming years Toshiro wonder if it had been that insidious effect that had driven his sibling from a simple jealousy that might have passed into full-blown psychosis.

[Exit and topic end]