Ever since my run in with The Rock, I was jumpy. Every shadow an unknown assailant, every corner an ambush. My slashing at shadows had also completely stopped - I was utterly convinced that if one person had armour like that, someone else had to have something equally disgusting, and I was putting myself at a disadvantage by stretching myself out and striking where there may be nothing. Even if I did catch someone, in the end, the risks probably outweighed the rewards.
After a while, I finally realized that my right arm wasn't just covered in The Rocks blood, it had my own on it as well. In those life or death moments, I'd run my arm against his rough armour and torn up a significant portion of my skin. At least it wasn't deep, though my arm was continuously itchy and I had to consciously resist the urge to scratch it. It wasn't a terribly large wound per se, but it bothered me greatly. Not to mention the risk of infection, or any number of problems that could arise.
Then there was my problem with water. And it was bad. My throat was completely parched, even though I'd only been here for around half a day.
It meant that I had one major priority. Get water. So how was I going to get water?
Well, I could search for it. I'd been walking for hours now, and I'd been walking at a good clip the entire time. A kilometer every twelve minutes, I'd say. That's around 50 kilometers. No water. Maybe I had to search for longer? This entire complex was obviously intentionally built. And I'd been intentionally placed in it. There was probably some source of water, right? I mean, they could make it without water to simply observe myself and others in a situation without a water source, but I hoped otherwise, as if that was a case then there wasn't much of a point of thinking this through. So, under the assumption that there is water, how else do I reach this water source?
I couldn't think of an alternative, so that meant a lot of walking awaited me. For a few hours agonizingly long hours I walked along, increasingly twitchy at everything around me and not feeling secure in the slightest. My knife quickly became a symbol of safety, as it was instrumental in getting me out of the previous encounter and I only felt safe with it firmly in my grasp. I'd feel a lot safer with a gun…
And I only got thirstier as I walked further along. I wasn't good with a lack of water, then or now.
Luckily for me, my hopes were answered soon afterwards when I walked down a patch of fog, quite a bit thicker than usual, to the point where it was almost opaque. Deciding to go down this hallway, after a few moments I seemed to cross some sort of invisible boundary and felt myself getting sucked in a little, with the fog cleared in front of me. It was still just as murky behind me however.
I found myself in a large, circular room, around 25 meters in diameter, and in the center was a large pool of water. O glorious water. It was sectioned off into quarters with a sizable amount of water in each section. That was my water situation solved right there if I could get to that life saving water. Of course, my first reaction was to rush in and get my hands on some of that precious liquid.
Fortunately for me, I knew what people did when they got their hands on a highly contested resource. They'd take proactive measures to ensure that it wasn't taken away from them. It made sense, but it also made my life a heck of a lot harder.
Of course, I could be the first one to stumble across this pool of water, but that seemed unlikely to me. I started walking forwards, knife up and ready to go. I first walked around the room, checking it over. Not much to look over, with it being a circular room. I could see everything inside the room at a glance, but I made sure to do a sweep anyway. The walls seperating the water were wide enough for me to walk on, but I still refused to take that chance. There was still plenty of room for me to walk around the pool of water anyways, a 5 meter wide ring of dry land to move on. There were four entrances in total, and each quarter of water was facing an exit.
After circling back to where I began, I took a knee and sunk my left hand into the water right in front of me. Refusing to stop looking around the room, I carefully brought up my left hand while keeping my knife at the ready.
I was ready to bolt at first contact.
Putting my left hand up to my mouth, I carefully drank. The water was cool and crisp, and tasted just fine. I knew about the whole bunch of health risks that I was exposing myself to, drinking water like that, but I needed water in my body. Even if I did have severe diarrhea or some sort of parasite afterwards. Heck, if the water was actually poisoned I'd still drink, as it was this or nothing anyways.
Next, I needed to wash my right arm. Still, I refused to let down my guard. That was what caused me to have to wash my arm in the first place; I was looking behind me when I ran to The Rock, and constant vigilance sounded like a fine plan for the time being after that incident. Putting both of my hands down into the pool, I started rubbing my right arm, gently trying to get the blood off. My knife was still in my right hand, and as I continued staring at the exits, I saw a small child slowly walk in the room from the entrance to my left. He immediately froze, but I was already moving by the time he saw me. The last thing his wide eyes saw was my knife before it sank deep into his throat.
Realizing he was going to die anyways, I wiggled my knife around a bit in an effort to kill him faster. Put him out of his misery
…
Realizing that I'd just killed a ten year old child completely unprovoked a few moments later, it was my turn for my eyes to go wide. Well, shit. I'd launched myself at him at the first hint of movement, and I had enough momentum that I couldn't stop myself without potentially stabbing myself in the process.
I mean, that wasn't entirely true. I could've stopped myself, but then there would've been an extremely loud scream coming from the kid and I really didn't want my location broadcasted to everyone in the area. The chances of me randomly bumping into someone where probably high enough. Stepping back a bit, I also realized that the kid had a bit of meat on him…
I was hungry, and if this would be my only food source…
The kid was dead anyways. He didn't need his body anymore, it was just a sack of flesh now that I'd separated all the thinking parts from the rest of the body. I could get myself a good few hundred calories at minimum...
Hold up, was I really considering - nay - justifying cannibalism?
What if I was?
Well, before I worried about that I'd have to loot his corpse of course. Kid had his own knife, a straight, steel variant that was quite unlike my own however, and a little pouch on his leg that you could hold things in, sorta like a really durable pocket.
AFter a few more moments of just staring into his glassy eyes, I finally went out the left side, dragging the dead kid along. He was pretty light, and I figured that I could use him as a shield. You could easily get a blade stuck in the rib cage if you weren't careful after all. As for the way I went, I figured that knowing the terrain better could potentially help in any possible fights, and maybe if I stayed in a smaller area it would attract less attention. Then again, maybe I wouldn't be able to find a way out if I stayed, so I finally decided that I'd pick the right corridor of the three other pathways. Increase the odds of me getting out. If I could escape without resorting to cannibalism, it'd be ideal.
The first sign of a serious problem came from the slowly dissipating fog. A serious deviation from the norm, as before then the fog had been a constant presence in the hallways of this maze, and it was almost unsettling to have an absence of them. Of course, this improved visibility drastically, but I suppose I was getting used to the fog. Did the dead kid on my back get a chance to get used to it as I did? I grimaced at that thought. Now really wasn't the time.
The second issue was much more noticeable, and it had to do with the ever increasing air temperature. I felt a sort of pressure all over my body, increasing in its supposed weight gradually as I continued walking forwards or stopped walking. I found my thoughts wandering and slowly it became more difficult to focus, while thoughts of running away were quickly increasing in number while at the same time I found myself wanting to simply freeze, and I'd have to jolt myself back into it.
Whatever this was, I didn't like it, not one bit. So, I trusted my gut instinct and started jogging away from it. I trusted my instincts, as they'd served me well in the past.
But, even as I jogged away, the feeling grew and grew, until it was starting to become unbearable. I was having trouble breathing, and everything that did get through were shallow breaths. I guess the fight or flight instinct within me had, for whatever reason, decided staying stationary was the best course of action, and I had to struggle to keep on moving. I had to consciously move legs to walk.
Terrifying, because my arms were locking up on their own, and I had constant images of myself dying in increasingly gruesome flashing across my mind. This was terrible, and I needed out. So, I focused on my legs, and kept on moving those muscles. In a desperate attempt to escape.
I finally identified the emotion I was experiencing, fear. Fear, and a feeling that someone was out to get you, out to kill you. I didn't know what could induce something so primal, what kind of drugs or gases could cause this, but I did know the further I went down the tunnel away from the pools of water the worse it got, so I was trudging my way back.
I soon had to start straining to move. It felt like I was trudging through knee high snow drifts, only my very own body was completely opposed to the idea and was resisting as much as it could.
And as I struggled against it, against my own muscles, sweat forming on my brow, I pushed until I felt something break. Suddenly, I felt power course through me. A deep, resonating feeling within me, empowering and invigorating feeling that cleared my mind. It was downright intoxicating with how good it felt.
… The fuck What kind of gases were there in the air? What was I getting high on?
Now, the only thing holding me back now was my own internal conflict. I was screaming at myself to move, but something inside me refused it. I didn't understand this. This didn't make any sense. Sure, sometimes I locked up before acting (many times too late). But I had been screaming at myself to get a grip and get moving for what felt like hours now. Why wasn't I bursting into an all out sprint yet? By now I should be running like the wind, even with this feeling of fear weighing down on me.
As I struggled, the feeling became greater and greater still, until I was seeing hallucinations of how I'd die constantly, living through terrible fears of mine, even those that I didn't know that I had up until that point. In a final move of desperation, I forced my legs to turn me to look backwards.
Bad idea. Bad, bad, bad idea. Because behind me was a snake. A giant one. Ten meters out. It's head was as wide as I was, and it was slithering right at me. Real deer in the headlights moment right there, I nearly shat myself. I did feel a slight warm sensation on my inner leg though. Still bad. Conscious thought went right out of the window. I couldn't think straight, and I couldn't move. Panic set in, then fear, and the two had a jolly good time mixing together inside my bundle of electrical signals. Eight meters. I was fixated on the snake, and I couldn't take my eyes of it. I needed to move, I needed to run. But, my legs simply wouldn't obey me. The fuck was going on?
For whatever reason, it brought up a memory, a very old memory. I was running, in a forest, god rays shining through the canopy. Running from what and to where, I couldn't remember (wasn't joking about the old memory part). I was getting exhausted and ended up tripping on my own feet and running my right arm through a particularly spiky bush. I remembered feeling the dozens of tiny pinpricks and scratches running along my forearm... It cleared my mind and I was back to running.
So, if pain could help with exhaustion by (to my understanding) pumping chemicals in you to get your ass in gear, why couldn't I do the same in this situation to get moving again? Just had to force my arm to move, and... stab myself. I didn't want to stab myse - four meters away now. So, before I could stop myself with doubts, I stabbed my knife into my upper left arm. I snapped out of it, and was out of there just like that.
Concentrating on my legs again, I dashed right down the hall, way too fast. Too much power in my legs, and I narrowly avoided face planting into a wall by skidding to a stop and starting to run again. Now mostly back into control I first slapped my right hand onto my wound, and then I was consciously thinking about my steps, estimating how far each stride would take me, and how I'd land. Concentrating on the running was difficult, but it did allow me to start avoid thinking about the snake, looming death and spiders.
I rather belatedly realized that I was most definitely being funnelled in this direction. Stopping immediately, I realized just how bad this could potentially be. Oh fuck. Dear god. I'm getting pushed towards the pool area. Was this something that happened with that dead kid? Got funnelled into a situation that he was utterly unprepared for? He did seem out of breath now that I thought about it…
Whatever the case, I wouldn't make the same mistake. I was at the ready again, trusty knife in hand, and I still wasn't ready to take much on.
I nearly stopped running as I heard a scream - really high pitched, definitely a guy - and flipped my knife around to a reverse grip before returning it to its initial orientation. A useful thing to be able to do in a fight, if a little flashy. Sometimes, that was the only way to get the angle that you desired.
Before I went into any fight, I, of course, had to take mental stock. Know yourself and know your enemy and in a hundred battles you shall never lose (or something like that). I couldn't get to know my enemy, so I may as well got to know myself. I had two knives on me, the knife I always had and a slightly shorter, straight knife, held in a small pouch on the side of my leg. Probably a throwing knife, even as large as it was. Of course, I couldn't throw it. So it was just a device to stab with. As far as injuries went, I had a decently sized stab wound on my left arm, which meant that I didn't have anywhere near my normal range of motion in that arm, and it was still throbbing, though mostly usable. The blood was drying and coagulating underneath my hand. Ripping off my sleeve on my right arm, I bandaged the stab, doing my best not to disturb my wound.
I still had my canteen, full of water. Taking it out, I took a drink while continuing to think. I had a meat shield of sorts, that weighed maybe 60 pounds. I could now run at faster speeds, albeit requiring almost all of my attention and with decreased control. It also tired me out considerably, and I just knew that my legs would be throbbing soon. I had, maybe a good ten minutes of that sort of running left in me. I also knew that I haven't pushed myself as far as I could go yet, I could still push a bit harder, but I didn't want to strain my body like that yet. Still, I now had a vague idea of what my limits were, which was very useful.
As far as fighting went, my best bet was probably the age old 'run away until you can deal with it later' tactic. I couldn't see many situations where it'd make sense for me to go on the offensive from the get go, and even then I'd probably hesitate or something of the sort and that idea would go down the drain quickly. Actually, if concentrating on my legs and pushing result in a noticeable increase in strength, then what would happen if I did the same thing only with my arms?
Knowing myself, I would either put way too much force behind it, dislocate my arm and break my hand, or completely miss and leave myself wide open for a counter attack. Personally, I didn't like either option. So that still left run away and wait for a better opportunity. I could do that. It wasn't even like boosting myself made that much of a difference. I guess the experience had shocked me a little bit initially, but while the difference was noticeable I wasn't going to be jumping five meters straight up any time soon.
I couldn't even hold back for much longer, as that fear factor would come into play whenever I was anywhere near that piece of shit. I was definitely not going through that again. So, I continued on, right up to the entrance to the Pool Room. Even with the lack of gas in the air, I could still feel that sucking feeling as I drew closer to the entrance, where I eventually simply lay in wait for a few moments. I'd wait for screams to happen, and go in on my own terms when I felt appropriate for myself. That was the plan, and as I slowly crept forwards, I hated it more and more. Fuck, did I try my odds with the snake or whatever unknown in the room ahead of me?
I didn't like my odds with the giant serpent. If that was the incorrect choice, then, well, I guess that I wouldn't have to live with the consequences for long (I'd be dead). Honestly, no better time for another long scream to fill the air, before being abruptly cut off.
That was the second one now, and I needed to get a fucking move on. How? Sure, I could charge right through that entrance, but what if they had projectiles? A trap of some sort? So fucking risky, but I'd have to go through with it. Really no other choice. So, I snuck up to the doorway to try and scope out the competition before I dived headfirst into them
Immediately, I saw two kids duking it out in the pool room. One's back was covered in porcupine quills, clutching his side. Apparently, he was the one screaming before. He'd try and get a shot off with his quills on the other combatant. Said other combatant had clearly lost his mind. He was running at porcupine headfirst, without a weapon in hand, slobber whipping around him. Like a rabid dog with blunt teeth. He was also completely covered in striped black tattoos head to toe.
He was running around extremely quickly, and his punch held considerable power behind it. Every time he missed porcupine and instead hit a wall, there would be a new crater. His lack of movement was always immediately followed by a burst of quills from porcupine, though he only had half of them left on his back and tattoos would simply shrug off the damage.
I thought that it couldn't get any better, but no, it could, because the both of them started running on water in a continued effort to gain the upper hand. Seriously, tattoos couldn't seem to make proper sentences and he was running on water? Incredible. I had to investigate this. They were spreading out their weight on the top of the water so as not to break the surface tension of the water.
In any case, I had to deal with the two of them some way. The easiest would probably to let them tire each other out further before swooping in and removing whoever was left. Or, I could come in if either of them produced an opening that I could exploit.
Of course porcupine noticed me, and as he glanced in my direction I saw his eyes widen a tiny bit. However, he obviously wasn't very good at the whole fighting schtick, because he diverted his attention long enough for tattoos to finally land a solid hit on porcupines back, resulting in his fist getting several new spikes and his face to quickly resemble the head of a broom. That was what I was waiting for.
I knew that I probably only had one shot to get this right, and I needed to be accurate about it. One hit to sever the brain from the rest of the body. So, I brought my knife around as I approached tattoos and stabbed him right through the back of his neck. He had a peculiar tattoo next to it though, like 3 commas in a circular shape.
Whatever the case, I made sure to slash his throat as well. Wouldn't take much extra time, and I was nothing if not thorough. I didn't want any surprises from him.
With that taken care of, I had to quickly duck behind my second meatshield as porcupine disengaged and began firing at me. That hit from tattoos must have hurt, and I could almost guarantee a great deal of internal bleeding. Honestly, it was a miracle that he could still move much less begin firing on me. So, after putting away my second knife I took the kid I was carrying off my shoulder and used him as shield. Tattoos was probably too heavy to work properly in this particular situation.
Using the kid to soak up any quills shot at me, I neared porcupine. At this point, he only had a quarter of the quills on his back remaining. While they were growing at an alarming rate, the newly forming quills on his back were at least a few minutes away from completion. More than enough time for me to finish this fight, even with a left arm that was starting to gush blood.
Continuing to run after him, I threw the kid at him. He was caught completely by surprise, but still managed to dodge the flying pincushion. Whatever. He had to move out of the way of the kid, and I round right around and sank my blade into his chest. He clutched at my hand for a few moments before finally ceasing to move.
Pulling my knife out, I cleaned the blade on his shirt and then washed my hands in one of the pools of water.
I looked over the room and smiled to myself, bobbing my head to some rhythm that I used to know very well. Crisis averted through a job well done. Note to self - never, under any circumstances, underestimate the element of surprise.
I was slowly building up my information of where I was dropped off. I now knew that people could walk on water, have animal characteristics, and get tattoos that greatly increases their strength (I couldn't attribute anything else to tattoos' raw power). I also had this weird power up boost inside me, and one of my top priorities was to properly utilize that.
But, a higher priority still would be too address my hunger and tiredness. I had done a lot of physical activity the past few hours, and I was slowly feeling the grasping claws of hunger close around me. If I wanted to stay in peak mental and physical condition then I needed calories inside me. I turned to porcupine.
It wasn't cannibalism if he was part porcupine, right?
Oh, who was I kidding. It really was.
But I needed food, and the humans laying around me were the only source of food around. They didn't have any other sources of calories on them other then their own meat and bones.
Even if I was going to eat them (I'd definitely try when I got desperate enough), I didn't know which parts I could eat without cooking. Or maybe they had diseases and were carrying them. I didn't want to kill myself by eating other people. That would be just sad.
Of course there was the snake, but the problem of cooking remained. I also had no clue how to prepare a snake. Humans on the other hand, were at least mammals. To top it off I had no guarantees that I could even kill the snake in the first place anyways. The thing was positively huge, and if it did it's fear aura thing then I was really boned.
Whatever the case, I still needed sleep. I was getting tired, and sleep would be extremely helpful. The water was cool, so maybe it could help me preserve some bodies for possible consumption. Actually it was kinda like a burial at sea - my thoughts when I dumped the kid and porcupine into separate bodies of water. I tried to drop them in in a way that was difficult to see that they were dead people, and it worked rather well. They didn't even float to the surface. However, I was going to bring tattoos with me, as even in death his skin was still hard and he had this durable skin on him. I'd rate him a 7/10 shield, the downsides being that he was a bit on the heavier side and didn't have a usable handle.
The new shield also meant that the flies and other insects would swarm a little less, though not by that much.
With the pool room cleaned up, I set out the way I came once again. I was slowly getting used to the maze, and quickly found where I leapt away from the snake with my first leap. Walking throughout these halls improved my memory on the layout considerably. A very useful experience indeed.
After a few minutes of searching after that point, I found a nice wall to sleep on. I lay there, barely awake, until I fully lost consciousness and greeted the void.
I woke up with my legs sore all over. I let out a muffled groan, before gently massaging them. I knew that this would happen, and unfortunately for me, it did. At least I didn't pull anything. I knew to not overstep my limits by too much. Standing up, I immediately fell back on the wall for support. My vision was covered in bright blue spots, I was dizzy, and I wanted to throw up. I'd experienced this plenty before. If I could see myself, I knew that my face would resemble Voldermort with a nose. Seems like things like these follow you past your (probable) death.
As that feeling gradually passed until it was just a dull nausea, I got off the wall, picked up my shield (he's dead. He wouldn't care that he's literally being a meat shield for me), and walked back to the pool room. The fog had returned, and the lack of many visual guides did not help with my nausea. After tripping a few more times and being forced to pause many times, I finally got to the pool room, the two bodies that I'd dumped were still in there original positions.
Slowly, I pulled porcupine back up by the leg on to dry land, and whipped out my knife. I proceeded to cut off both of his calves, and sank my knife into his stomach area. Liver was edible.
Right?
Whatever…
Where was the liver placed again?
Dear god, I was in for a fun time.
After I'd finished butchering porcupine, my hands were covered with plenty of blood. There were a whole bunch of damaged organs as well, likely from his fight with tattoos. After wiping off my hands in the water, keeping up the same paranoia I previously had, I stabbed all (hopefully) edible pieces of meat with my second knife, and I slung tattoos over my shoulder again. I set back out once more, into the tunnels.
I didn't make it far before quitting and sitting down. It really wasn't that bad, but it was definitely unpleasant. I stared at the calves a little bit more. Eating a little bit was worse then not eating whatsoever, and the first few days of starvation were the worst before the effects tapered off a bit. Then again, maybe I'd cross the point of no return and not have enough calories to get my digestive system in motion.
I gulped. I really was going to do this, huh? So, I cut off a piece of what was hopefully liver, and stuck it in my mouth and started chewing. It was… a peculiar taste and flavour. Sure, it tasted like meat, but it had a squishy, almost smooth texture to it. Sometimes it was a little chewier, but there were also extremely bitter parts to it as well. That was where I promptly spit it out. It was most definitely edible, and I'd eat it. Just, it would take a while to get used to it. The stuff was ok until the bitter parts game up, in which it turned from palatable to piss flavoured broccoli. A true delicacy.
Maybe the terrible taste came from the quills on the guys back? Those were most definitely not natural, and perhaps whatever lab modifications were what caused this whole thing. I'd personally never had liver before, but if it tasted that bad I didn't think that I'd be nearly as popular as I'd been led to believe.
Whatever the case, with the next bit of liver I forced myself to swallow it down, whatever the taste. Calories were important. And I was burning quite a few of them apparently. I didn't feel good to eat body parts, but hey, if it was me or some sentient dickhead I'd never had the pleasure of meeting before, then you'd have to wipe your answer off the ground while I clean my blade on your shirt.
Woo... This is getting interesting. Never would get this much excitement in Konoha, that's for sure. I should even be able to convince Orochimaru not to slap a curse mark on him.
A/N So, I'd like to start this authors note with a huge thank you to everyone who's read, and continues to read this story. Even with it not having many words. And the infrequent uploads… Thank you for giving this a shot, even through all of that. This story started on Thanksgiving, and it's Christmas already.
(we're in for a long A/N everyone. Hey, it's a 5000 word chapter. I don't care. Long enough for a long A/N. Been sitting on this for weeks now. 'Bout time I whipped it out and started boasting about its length)
Posting this on Christmas day is really smart, considering a lot of people aren't on fanfiction reading right now (at least I hope you aren't. Then you'd be as lame as me, and that's no fun. Thanks for reading anyways though). But hey, I said that I'd probably do it, so I did.
I have a few smaller updates planned for the next week, so there's going to be some bits of content before it all dries up for a few months. My next guarantee after those updates would be an update in July. Yeah, not looking so good. A lot of other stuff going on during that time. I'm just trying to shit out as much of this as I can before other things take priority.
Anyhow, please do review, favourite and follow if you enjoyed. All feedback is appreciated, no matter the nature of your review.
