Chapter 28: Dangerous Unexpected Enemies
"Is she ready?" Akane asked Gai after he safely unstrapped his kunoichi student and used the removed straps to keep her IV bag close and connected.
"She should be. But I'm going to take her up instead and watch over her and the others. You three go help out the rest." Gai told them. Without waiting for a response, he held his student close to him and moved thru the ground to take her up to the surface.
"Guess we better go see what Hanabi-sensei and the others are doing." Akane commented.
"It can't be much after all. Everything's so quiet." Ichi stated.
Smoke cleared to reveal Hanabi standing in front of Kakashi and Tatsu, panting. 'I'm glad using the Rotation in front of them deflected the attack.' Their surprise attacker had just used a wide range fire jutsu against them, and Hanabi was the quickest to react.
"What is the meaning of this?" Kakashi demanded, drawing a kunai and taking a stance.
"Nothing personal Kakashi-san, it's just business." Their assaulter, Noyumi, replied.
"I've heard that a lot, but it never truly answers the question he just asked." Hanabi stated.
"Well, if it makes you feel any better, you were right. Someone does have to defend this place, and that's where I come in." The Hoshi kunoichi answered.
"Is all of Hoshi in on this?" Kakashi asked.
Noyumi scoffed. "Oh please. If they were they'd be here trying to destroy this place and it's important work. My job is to ensure no one like you ever actually finds it, but now that you have, I'll have to kill you and get any of the girls you've returned to the surface back down here."
"How can you support this?" Hanabi almost shouted.
"It's because Hoshi needs this research." Noyumi told them. "We have a small population and a high fatality rate. Our best jutsu killed most who learn or use it, and now the source of it is gone forever. At the rate we're going, our village will disappear in a generation or two, or we'll suffer the same fate as Yuugakure. But if Batsumori-sama can figure out how to make her objective work, we can at least delay our demise until we find a new way to do our jobs better."
Tatsu stepped forward. "I can understand your desire to avoid disaster, but can you really put someone else thru disaster to keep yourself out of it?"
"Nothing is gained without sacrifice kid. You yourself use your bugs to do most of your work so don't you lecture me about letting something else take the kunai for you if it means you can live to see another day." Noyumi angrily replied.
"My insects are a part of me and I a part of them. We suffer and gain together."The young Aburame countered.
"What is your objective? What exactly are you trying to find?" Kakashi asked.
Noyumi gave him a flat look. "This isn't a movie you know, where the good guy asks the bad guy why everything is happening, and the bad guy gets into a monologue. I'm smarter than a cinema cliche."
Kakashi glanced towards the room where the others were, hearing a noise that clearly indicated fighting was going on. 'I better go check on those two.' He tried to run towards the door.
"Oh no you don't. Ninja Art Kujaku Rope." Noyumi said, creating a hand sign none of the Konoha ninja had ever seen before and casting a violet chakra aura that resembled a peacock's tail. From that tail emerged a chakra whip that cut down hard in front of Kakashi, making him stop in his tracks. The attack left a small tear on the linoleum floor.
"How can you know that?" Hanabi asked. "From what I heard, Hoshi lost the ability to teach anyone that technique ten years ago and those that do know it have all died off by now."
"Not all of us." Noyumi replied. From behind her, each feather of her peacock tail turned into a chakra whip and lashed out in all directions but primarily forward. The three Konoha nin had to back up to get out of her range, now unsure how to retaliate.
'I just hope Masa and Sayo can handle their fight.' Kakashi thought.
Takuma, like Noyumi, had tried attacking the Konoha nin by surprise from behind. Masa however was more aware of his surroundings than Takuma gave him credit for and pulled out one of his swords. The purple-haired genin aimed his attack right for the Hoshi ninja's hands, stopping him from completing his jutsu.
"Masa, what are you doing?" Sayo asked.
"Keeping this guy from killing us." He replied.
"You only delayed me. You haven't stopped me completely." Takuma stated. He stepped back and moved a panel to reveal a button. He pushed it, and right away all the shelves of blood vials were pulled into hidden compartments, keeping them from being potentially damaged in a fight.
"What the hell are you doing?" Sayo asked.
"Sayo, my guess is this guy isn't really on our side." Masa told her, his eyes never leaving the man in front of him.
"We had a feeling someone would show up trying to find this place, especially after Hoshikage-sama sent word for you. Fortunately we intercepted you before you could reach the village so you wouldn't hear more than necessary."
"If eliminating us was the plan you had from the beginning, then why did you wait until now to act?" Masa asked.
"We needed to see if it was possible for someone to find this place. If you couldn't then we were safe, but now that we know others can find this place the ones working here can better prepare themselves." Takuma answered.
"Why are you supporting this practice of kidnapping and stealing blood?" Masa asked, starting to sound angry, something Sayo had never heard in his voice before.
"Do you not fear death? Well I do. I've been too close to death too many times for my sake, and I for one am tired of it. So when I was approached by a woman promising to find a way to cheat death permanently, I was not a tough sale."
Sayo looked pissed. "So you damn girls to hell to settle your fear of death?"
"Hey, I've faced the kind of threats you've only read about while those girls out there think the biggest problem they can have is an empty wallet or bed. I think I've earned piece of mind more than them and I don't care if you disagree." The Hoshi nin irritably argued.
Sayo immediately yet casually walked up to Takuma and-of all things-spit directly into his left eye.
Takuma was confused and bothered but not worried by such an act and rubbed the saliva out of his eye. As he did though, he noticed it started to burn. "AGH! My eye! What the hell did you do you bitch?" After some more rubbing, he found his sight in that eye had blurred away to almost nothing.
"Just the simplest trick the Shichou clan has." Sayo answered with a pleased tone and expression, before spitting in his right eye.
Takuma reacted the same as last time, and soon found himself blind. In desperation, he swung his kunai at where he thought she was, but was blocked by Masa's sword.
"Good job Masa, but my saliva's not going to last for long." Sayo told her teammate.
'I may have a hard time seeing, but these kids apparently don't have it in them to kill me.' Takuma thought. 'The boy's just holding me back and the girl's not making any moves as far as I can tell. What a bunch of wimps.' He then dropped his kunai and formed a strange hand sign. "Ninja Art Kujaku Claws." A violet aura formed around him and turned into a set of arms with four fingers that reached for both genin.
Masa took a step back and pulled out his second sword, meaning he had one in each hand and was using both to cut the chakra arms. The severed hands sort of faded away but the arms regrew new ones, requiring him to keep slashing.
'Masa's ambidextrous?' Sayo asked herself. 'No time for that. I better try one of my better techniques to take this guy down.' She ran to the door to the room and closed it shut, keeping anyone from going in or out, then reached into her supply pouch and pulled out a breathing mask. "Masa catch!" She shouted as she tossed it to her teammate.
His hands were full so Masa had to plant one of his swords into the floor so he could catch her mask. Once it was in his hands he strapped it over his mouth and nose with goggles covering his eyes. Takuma's vision was starting to come back so he slowed down his random attacks, but now he had an idea of where to aim.
Sayo quickly formed three hand signs. "Poison Fog Jutsu." From out of her mouth spewed a dark purple-black cloud that would spread over the entire room.
Takuma saw and heard this jutsu and laughed. "Foolish girl. Anti-poison equipment is a standard for us Hoshi nin." He dropped his kujaku cloak and placed a breathing mask over his face. The only thing that concerned him was that the brown-haired girl wasn't wearing a mask herself, even when the toxic fog filled up the entire room. In fact, Sayo didn't even gag at the gas.
Ignoring that, Takuma cast another jutsu. "Ninja Art Kujaku Claws." This time, multiple arms emerged from his violet cloak and moved with direct aim. Four overwhelmed Masa who couldn't move fast enough to cut them all and two even pinned Sayo against a wall. Both genin had hands around their throats, strangling them. "You two may have impressive surprises, but you're still just novices, naive to the shinobi world you were so eager to join." He stepped up to Sayo. "You're too dangerous to keep alive, but maybe the ones here can use your blood." He pulled out a knife.
"Keep... your disgusting hands-" Sayo tried to say, unable to find an exposed spot on him to target. She was silenced when she felt his knife get driven into her left shoulder. making her scream. Takuma took out a vial and held it to catch some of her dripping blood.
"I wonder if they'll pay me extra for providing kunoichi blood directly. If it's a water element that is." Takuma commented.
'Water element?' Sayo asked herself. 'Was that the common factor in all the victims? They were after girls with water type chakra to take their blood? Why?'
Takuma looked right into her eyes, his mask giving him a somewhat more intimidating look. "I didn't like being blinded by your strange saliva, so how about I blind you in a much more painful way?" Sayo immediately looked worried, which is what he was looking for. "You fear death, don't you? So maybe now you'll understand why I'm doing this. In shinobi life, it's always either you or someone else who dies, and we all instinctively choose ourselves in that. The only difference is I'm not afraid to admit it."
Sayo instantly reaching out with her free hand and ripped the Hoshi nin's mask off his face. The room was still filled with her poison fog, something only Sayo didn't seem bothered by, so he gasped and held his breath before he could inhale any toxic vapors. Putting away the collected blood, he used his kujaku arms to shove Sayo onto the ground where he wrapped his two real arms around her throat, hoping to suffocate her himself, slow enough to see her panic as she died.
Masa struggled to get free but four chakra arms kept him pinned down too. He couldn't even move enough to cut them, and he didn't know any jutsu to enhance his sword skills. 'Kami-sama, someone help us.'
Back in the other room, Kakashi was keeping Noyumi busy by throwing several jutsu at her, keeping her from targeting anyone else. Hanabi tried to get close too but her kujaku cloak was making it difficult for her to get any direct attacks.
Tatsu refrained from the fight since his insects didn't like the feeling they got from that violet chakra. They could only describe it as unnatural for a person. So he chose to inspect the other door in the room, the one that up until then everyone else had ignored. 'I'm certain there's something here we should know about, if I can just open it.' His swarm was busy trying to find a way to get thru while he tried breaking the lock himself too.
All of a sudden the door unlocked and opened, but Tatsu immediately knew it wasn't because of his efforts. He recalled his swarm and jumped aside before a spear shot out towards where he would have been.
The sound of creaking could be heard from inside, making Tatsu none too eager to check it out, but now he knew what to expect. He looked into the room, which was dark but lit enough to see it was a fancy bedroom, the kind you'd expect to see a noble have. Facing the door was something very out of place, a mounted crossbow big enough to fire a javelin, a scorpion crossbow if Tatsu remembered correctly. It was empty, but a woman was preparing to reload and fire it.
If this wasn't a serious situation, Tatsu might have thought the woman was quite beautiful. Her hair was long enough to reach her ass and was a deep mixture of light brunette and dark blonde, almost looking like it was spun from bronze. Her eyes were difficult to see, but they were bright enough to not be masked by the shadows of the room. She was wearing some sort of royal purple nightgown with royal blue hem on it, giving her a sort of provocative look at the moment. Of course, the fact that she was loading a crossbow kind of took away the appeal she had.
"I don't know who you cretins are, but you've made me mad." She declared, ready to pierce Tatsu with her weapon.
