KIRISAKI DAĪCHI
Satsuki sprinted through the snow, breath fogging before her with every sharp exhale. Behind her she sensed three chakra signatures – fast approaching. She needed to stop and perform the transportation jutsu, but she couldn't afford it. She hadn't the time.
She felt the burst of chakra and she leapt into the foliage without a moment to spare. A sharp blast of wind exploded the ground where she'd just been standing. She turned to fight, knowing there wasn't many options.
The first one to reach her was a shinobi. She struck his neck while he was reaching the end of his ascent into the bare trees. He dropped like a stone, and began to spasm wildly. She heard the surprised shout of his comrades, and took the opportunity to drop down on the other shinobi with the intention of performing a similar move.
He had sensed her approach, and he spun out of the way, sending a handful of shiruken her way. She dodged – just barely – the feel of the folded documents at her breast pocket reminding her of the urgency with which they needed to be sent back to Touou.
What a force like Kirisaki Daīchi could do with extensive information on the Generation of Miracles – Satsuki didn't want to think about it. They'd only just managed to recover Kiyoshi Teppei of Seirin from their clutches, and had lost many valued jounins of the allied villages in the attempt.
Satsuki herself had been head of the mission assignments – she, knowing each and every ninja, their stories, their abilities, their potentials. She took calculated risks, smiled when the teams pulled through and pretended the ones that didn't were just a necessary sacrifice.
She was the one who volunteered to take up a disguise and enter the village of Kirisaki Daīchi under the guise of a medic. They needed to know how much information the hostile village had gathered on the allied forces. Satsuki had spent weeks with hair a dark brown, eyes henged the colour of dirt.
They were in dire need of medics, and so her cover story had held under their mild scrutiny.
Not an hour ago, she'd snuck into the head interrogator's office, and, aghast at the sheer quantity of information they'd acquired, she burnt them to the ground. She'd been on her way out when she spotted the interrogator's desk, and found information on the Generation of Miracles. Knowing that burning them would do little good, as the interrogator probably committed the most important information to memory, Satsuki retrieved all the files she could, and hurriedly folded them, tucking them into the front pocket of her navy Touou vest.
From there she'd donned a heavy cloak and made her escape. The fire in the interrogator's office had set off the alarms, so Satsuki employed a teleportation jutsu to the outskirts of Kirisaki. Unfortunately, tracker Nins had been sent after her chakra signature.
She swerved away from the shinobi's senbon, noting the unnatural glisten and scent as they whizzed past her.
Poison.
She executed a feint to his legs as she snatched up his fallen senbon, and landed a hit to the tips of his fingers that sent a shock of destructive chakra back into his arm. She ignored the agonised scream that followed the sickening cracking, busying herself with slipping the adopted weapons into her pouch.
"My teammates – you couldn't have – but-"
The kunoichi was in obvious distress. Satsuki utilised the moment to speak. "If you do not help them now, they will both die within minutes."
And she turned on her heel and sprinted south, for home.
A burst of chakra to enhance her hearing, she heard the choked speech of the shinobi she'd shattered, "…her! Finish this mission, Haruka. For – F-For us…"
Satsuki cursed her luck. Of course, she had to attack perhaps the only sentimental team within the boundaries of Kirisaki Daīchi.
Unfortunately for her, the kunoichi was a long range fighter. Satsuki was very much a taijutsu specialist, and didn't have much strategy against long range fighters. So she dodged the array of kunai and senbon, ducked beneath the trajectory path of a rather gruesome looking hook, rolled away from the rain of wickedly jagged daggers.
Conjuring a map of the terrain, Satsuki hurled herself to the left and continued through the sparse forest, aware of many pointed weapons embedding themselves into trees, the ground beside her, her cloak – Satsuki whirled out of the thick item of clothing as the kunoichi made an attempt to pin her to a tree with it. Ignoring the biting cold as best she could, the Touou kunoichi mentally flitted through the best combination of handseals to transport her home without completely emptying her startlingly low chakra reserves.
She made it to the cliff face at last, and with a quick look over her shoulder to check that the kunoichi could see her, she stepped off the edge. Chakra, to her feet, a concealment jutsu expertly executed, and Satsuki hovered just below the cliff edge, ready to run down the vertical drop as soon as the kunoichi cleared the area.
Satsuki hadn't counted on the kunoichi's determination. The enemy sent chakra to her feet, and started down the precipice too, weapons out and ready. The Touou kunoichi began sprinting, leaping for a tree as she got close enough. She used the tree as a springboard, rocketing towards the enemy, still under the concealment jutsu. She slammed her fist into the woman's solar plexus, hard enough to shove the body against the cliff face.
With the woman's moments of paralysis limited, Satsuki released the concealment jutsu and ricocheted off the rock wall, landing safely in the trees below. She took a moment to catch her breath – she was relieved to have made it out alive-
A sharp whoosh, and Satsuki barely threw herself out of the way of the hooked menace. But something burning hot had wrapped around her leg – and with a yelp, she was pulled from her perch on the branch by the enemy kunoichi's chakra ropes.
Wondering how the hell she hadn't predicted that, Satsuki spun, just barely easing her landing by channelling chakra to her right side. Nevertheless, her side became soaked as the snow melted into her clothes. She cursed. Frostbite was not something she was willing to risk.
She spared a moment to create a clone, and in the next she turned to deal with the troublesome kunoichi.
And then she promptly froze in her tracks.
"Paralysis jutsu," coughed the kunoichi through what Satsuki knew to be several broken ribs. "I'm surprised you didn't expect that from me, dear Sa-chan."
If Satsuki hadn't been paralysed, she would have been through the use of her cutesy nickname.
"You missed it. Your prodigiously sharp mind, your impeccable memory! Missed me! Tch!"
The ninja limped towards her, breaths ragged. Satsuki noted the trail of blood in her wake, no doubt from her back – the punch must've done a number on her. With her eyes still a mud brown, the Touou nin focused on the face of the woman approaching her.
Soft, round eyes. High cheekbones, a sharp chin. She almost choked as she tried to spit the name Mitsumi.
"They always favoured you at Teikou. Kirisaki isn't as nearly as discriminative. I learnt a thing or two. Maybe you really did forget me. Mustn't have been important enough to note. A sort of blessing, I guess."
Mitsumi drew a long, jagged dagger – and Satsuki attempted to break free of the jutsu.
"You can't control your chakra, eh? Thank Shisui's poison for that."
The Touou kunoichi raked her mind for any sensation of a scratch – a nick, a prick – anything that hinted to poison. If she could zero in on the scratch, focus her chakra to it, she could track the poison and let it metabolise through her system at an increased rate.
"You breathed it in."
Satsuki could feel her chest beginning to turn numb, and she wondered at the point of her analytical foresight if she couldn't have predicted something like this.
"I wonder if you can see your future now, Sa-chan?"
She took a step closer. Satsuki didn't need to project anything as she watched – rather detached – as Mitsumi's arm drew back. She knew it was coming – dread pulled at her paralysed bones – and then –
Satsuki choked on her breath as the Kirisaki nin buried the dagger hilt deep, just below her ribs. With the shock, her henge faded.
She felt herself return to normal, saw the critical gleam in Mitsumi's eye – her own reflection, hair pink once more.
The Kirisaki kunoichi left the dagger in long enough for Satsuki to feel the startlingly cold slickness of the foreign metal. She removed it in one sharp tug, and swung the hilt of the dagger into Satsuki's temple, releasing her from the jutsu.
Curled up on the ground, the Touou kunoichi could hear Mitsumi's ragged breaths as she walked away.
And then sensation was thrust back into her limbs.
She realised someone was sobbing – it was choked, pitiful – it was her.
Blood, everywhere – everywhere.
She was going to die – she was dying, and she hadn't even – the mission!
Somehow she shoved herself up from the bloodstained snow, the puddle of red growing more rapidly than Satsuki wanted to keep track of.
With shaking hands, she withdrew the thick wad of folded documents, and, pushing through the pain in her head, she crunched them together and began the seals. She tried to ignore the blood dripping from her temple onto the papers, soaking into the corners from her bloodstained hands.
With a start she remembered to tear a pen from her vest and scrawl; 'Mass intel on other hidden villages destroyed.'
And then she proceeded with the seals.
Home – get them home. This mission can't be for nothing. Home.
They disappeared with a pop, and Satsuki's sight began to cloud around the edges. She had just enough sense to roll onto her back – and then she placed her hands above the wound.
Heal – please, kami – just heal.
She sent chakra to her palms, felt it surge past the poison in stunted waves. Felt the burn, the war between the poison in her system and the blood loss.
Blood loss will kill me sooner. Stop the blood. Clot it. Clot. Clot.
Her awareness began to fade.
Wolves. There will be forest animals. Cover. Find cover.
One hand pressed to her wound, she turned onto her stomach and began to crawl, bringing images of her map to mind when her blurred vision failed her.
Left. To the left. Trees, rocks – find cover.
And just before she lost consciousness, she dragged herself beneath an overhanging rock. Night was falling.
I'm going to die.