Chapter One: Not Quite Dead
Tayuya's legs hurt. Badly. She vaguely remembered a tree falling on them thanks to a blonde girl with a stupid haircut coming in to save that damned rat Tayuya had been fighting, the cheating bitch. Was she still under the tree? She couldn't tell. Her legs hurt, but it didn't feel like any weight was on them. Her eyes were closed and, strangely, wouldn't open. However, she realized she was hearing voices around her. She tried to focus on those and not the immense pain in her legs.
"How she still alive?" asked one of the voices, gruff, scratchy, and rather simple.
"She almost wasn't," the other voice, far more melodic and higher-pitched though still masculine, replied. "If we were even thirty seconds later, it's likely the girl would be dead."
"But she ain't," said the gruff one again. "Her legs is broked, though."
"Yes, and not healing them is deliberate. It wouldn't do if she were to run away before we can sell her. A young girl this pretty should fetch a decent price."
"But if she gots broked legs..."
"I can heal them, Itsuki. I'll do so before we sell her."
You fuckers aren't gonna sell me!, Tayuya tried to say, though she found herself emitting a muffled sound, her mouth unable to open. It was then that she felt the cloth covering her head and the ropes binding her arms in front of her.
"Aha! I think she's waking up, Itsuki. Good. Throw her in the cart." Tayuya felt herself rise from the ground, fly briefly through the air, and crash hard onto something wooden. She let out a muffled scream of pain, tears welling in her eyes as her legs bent oddly against the wooden walls of the cart.
"I didn't mean literally throw her."
"Oops. Sorry."
Tayuya's consciousness faded again.
When Tayuya awoke, she was sitting on the floor of a small, dirty room. There was a bucket in the opposite corner to Tayuya and a tattered sheet on the floor next to her corner, but nothing else. She was wearing only a ragged shirt, one far too large for her that covered down to her mid-thighs. Her legs were no longer broken, though her arms were still bound in front of her, and she had a cloth tied over her mouth as a gag. There were no real windows, just three small slits in the wall from which light filtered in. It must have been about noon. The door to the room was iron, with a small opening near the floor and a second at about eye-level. Peering at her from the second opening was a pair of eyes, bright blue and framed by glasses. "Kabu...to...?" she managed.
"What's this about a helmet?" the eyes asked, the same voice that had talked about selling her. "Did you lose a helmet or something? Well, if you did, it doesn't matter. Whoever you were in life before this, from today on, you're nobody. Understand?"
Tayuya would've liked to have told him in vivid detail how he could go fuck himself, but the gag made that impossible. She managed to lift her arms in front of her and flip him off, though.
The man laughed. "Oh, you do have some spirit! Maybe Itsuki and I will have to break you in before we can sell you. Or maybe someone will prefer a slave with an attitude problem, who knows?" With that, he slammed the peephole shut, leaving Tayuya alone in her prison.
With the man gone, Tayuya immediately began analyzing the situation to its fullest. She was bound, gagged, and locked in a small cell with no equipment save a shirt, a sheet, and a bucket. Her captors included a presumably-strong man named Itsuki and this unnamed medical ninja. Their plan was to sell her as a slave. She had no assets save her training, and even that was of minimal use without her flute. In addition, she knew next-to-nothing about her captors, though they seemed to know the same about her. She could use that to her advantage, though not immediately. She would have to further asses her captors and whereabouts in order to escape, though she assumed it would be difficult, given the nature of her cell. The bindings on her arms were nothing; with the Escape Jutsu, she could be out of those in seconds, though she figured it was best to avoid using it until the time came to actually escape. With her minimal assets, tunneling through would be near-impossible.
Tayuya let out a short sigh. Nothing about this situation looked good at all.
After a few moments of thought, she heard the medic-nin's voice from the other side of the door. "No, Itsuki, we're not going to feed her. She's only going to be in here for a day at the most."
"But if we don't feed her, she'll be hungry!"
"That's not our concern. We have a buyer seeking specifically girls of her age. When I mentioned her looks, he got a bit more interested. Heh heh. He's on his way here now."
Shit. They already have a buyer?! Tayuya would have to accelerate her plans, though what could she possibly do?
"Still don't feel right-like," Itsuki muttered.
"Itsuki. We're criminals and slavers. What we do now isn't 'right-like,' but it's necessary. We're not welcome anywhere else."
The voices moved out of earshot before Tayuya could hear any more. So, her situation was even more hopeless. Her one opportunity was to use the Escape Jutsu, cover herself with the sheet, and wait for them to come back to get her for the sale. She'd fight her way out then. Tayuya concentrated her chakra into her bound arms, or tried to. Her head began to buzz as soon as she attempted to charge her chakra, and she felt an odd sting on her shoulder. Tayuya glanced down and saw a sealing pattern, of the type used to lock out chakra use. So her captors knew she was a ninja. Shit. Tayuya felt a wave of exhaustion hit her, likely from the seal and her exertion. She fainted, and was unconscious before her head hit the ground.
"... can see, she's quite pretty," came the medic-nin's voice, rousing Tayuya from her fainting spell. "Red hair is rather sought-after, is it not?" Tayuya was lying on her back on some kind of table, her hands bound to the corners and her legs bound to the opposite ones. She was naked, blindfolded, and gagged.
"Is she a virgin?" came the reply from what she assumed was the buyer. His voice sounded old and decrepit, the voice one would assume a corpse would have if it could talk.
"It's difficult to tell. We didn't use her though," the medic-nin assured the buyer.
"Is she a ninja...?"
"Yes, presumably. She possessed a number of ninja tools, as well as an odd seal on the back of her neck. We sealed her chakra anyway."
"I see. Very well. The agreed price was two million ryo, yes?"
"Uh... I believe so."
Tayuya heard two swift hissing noises, followed by two dull thuds.
"Fools," the buyer chuckled. "No slave is ever worth that much."
Tayuya felt the bindings on her left leg untie, followed by her right. Thinking quickly, Tayuya decided to attack this old buyer as soon as he made it to her arms.
"Hm... but perhaps I had better sample the merchandise first...?" he mused to himself. Tayuya felt a wrinkled hand run down her side. "Yes... a sample before I take her home." He tied her legs back onto the table as disgust and fear welled within Tayuya...
When the old man was done, Tayuya was trembling, crying from pain, despair, and fear. She was still bound, gagged and blindfolded.
"Oho, what's this?" mumbled the old man. "This table is on wheels, is it? Hm. Perhaps I won't have to untie you after all, pretty one... What's this? Are you crying? Keh heh heh heh. Don't cry, love. I'm not going to hurt you. Oh, no. I don't hurt the pretty ones." Tayuya felt the table she was on move forward slowly. "No, I like the pretty ones to last a good, long while..."