火
CHAPTER FIFTY
The Ripples Of Evil
~Erisu~
A pensive gloom had settled over the team as they journeyed across the final stretch of farmland beneath a steadily rising sun. The outlaying fields were less maintained, some still flooded with murky water, their golden tendrils sagging limp and forgotten.
The crops gave way to thickets of brambles and clutters of heather as Pakkun led the troupe along an overgrown, rarely trod path that wound away into the wood.
The forest was devoid of wildlife. An eerie silence hung in the close air beneath the dense canopy and a whispering chill was sweeping down from the north. Above, the trees were in the full throws of autumn, their leaves like a ceiling of cold fire. It was a mirror of the chaos the night before, minus the warmth.
Even Yusha understood the necessity of silence as they neared the rogues' encampment. They fell into single file, back in their original formation with Kakashi in the lead, their prisoner in the centre and the Hyūga bringing up the rear.
Pakkun slowed as his fur began to bristle with anticipation. Kakashi slunk after him, nose to the wind, as the hound lead them to a thick crop of ferns.
"Through there," Pakkun growled, inclining his head through the curling floral swords.
Kakashi soundlessly parted the feathery fronds and the team peered down into a clearing of packed soil. A tilted boulder, strangled in moss, hung over half of the opening and a crude lean-to had been stacked against it. Beneath the poorly constructed shelter was a horde of supplies and a couple of beds of straw and moth-eaten blankets. Around a cooking fire at the heart of the clearing were huddled a dozen shapes trying to warm their bony hands.
The figures were stiff and silent. None of them spoke as they sat, almost cowering in the chill of the wood. An unpleasant scent hung in the air, the mingled musk of body odour and the sour undertone of spoiling food. It looked more like a cluster of half-starved beggars than a gang of outlaws. It was hard to believe these people could stand, let alone control an entire village.
Erisu wasn't sure what she'd been expecting the test subjects to look like but this surely wasn't it. She extended her mind to them as the rest of the team joined them to assess the targets.
"O-sama..." She began as she detected something alarming.
"I sense it too," Yuma said darkly behind her.
"What's wrong with them?" Sota hissed nervously.
Everyone could tell that there was something off about the rogues below, what though, they couldn't say.
"Yamato," Kakashi said in a low voice, "you know the most about Orochimaru's experiments out of anyone here. Can you tell what's been done to them?"
"I'm not sure." Yamato's voice was even more uptight than usual.
Erisu turned her face back to the group of people below. They were cloaked, their faces lost in the heavy shadows of their hoods. It was difficult to make out any of their features clearly, but their hands... One of the figures opened a blackened pot that hung on a spit over the meagre flames and scooped out a bowlful of what looked like miso soup. The team seemed to have arrived in time for breakfast.
"We should spread out," Kiyomi spoke up in a whisper. "We can easily kill them all from the surrounding trees while they're busy eating." She mimed a barrage of kunai. "Nice and quick. Then we can be on our way with little to no time wasted."
"What?!" Yusha's voice raised dangerously high and Yamato hissed for silence. "What?" He repeated, quieter. "That's murder..!"
She gave him a pitying look. "No shit."
"We can't just kill them..!" Yusha insisted. "It's immoral..!"
"Oh please, not this again." Kiyomi flicked open her kunai holster. "It's too early for a debate. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to do what I was trained for."
"This is what's wrong with ninjas!"
"Shhh!"
"You're always so quick to kill when we could be talking it over with them..!"
"I don't think we should kill them either," drawled Yuma.
Yusha beamed. "Thank you! Finally a ninja with a moral compass!"
"It's not our job and I don't want to waste any knives on them." Yuma added with a nasty smirk at Erisu's brother. "Let's just ignore them."
"So they can keep extorting the village?" Kiyomi scoffed in disbelief. "Look at them..! They already look half dead as it is. Killing them would be a mercy to the villagers and the guinea pigs alike."
"We should capture them," Yamato said grimly.
"We can't be hauling a dozen lab rats through the Land of Iron," Kiyomi argued.
"With my Wood Release we could trap them until we're done with the Cult and then collect them on our way back to Konoha."
"What good would that do?" Sota wondered. "What information could they have?"
"They must know the location of at least one of Orochimaru's hideouts," Yamato replied, "they could give us an idea as to how many other test subjects are still in the area and tell us where those scarecrows came from and if there are more of them lurking around somewhere."
"What do you think, Kakashi-taichou?" Sota asked.
Kakashi took a while to answer, his dark eye unreadable and fixed on the people in the clearing. "They might know something about Sasuke," he said at last. "They might be able to give us information on his new teammates as well."
"So you agree that we should capture them, Sempai?"
Kakashi didn't answer, his gaze still on the targets.
"They won't know anything," Yuma said, "they're kept in confinement. It's not as if they were dinner guests at Orochimaru's table."
"You haven't said anything yet, Imōto," Yusha piped up and Erisu could feel his eyes on her like green spotlights. "What does our local medical professional and expert on all things emotional think we should do?"
Erisu's mind was racing and she couldn't help smiling as an idea occurred. "This is perfect," she whispered excitedly, ignoring the six other sets of eyes that had turned to her. "They're the solution..!"
"What are you on about?" Yuma asked grudgingly.
"The villagers are emaciated and lacking strong arms due to Orochimaru-sama's cruelty." She turned round to face Kakashi specifically. "I was feeling torn by our responsibility to the directive and my desire to strengthen the village. But if we could persuade the rogue test subjects to rebuild the village in our stead it'd not only help the people but also turn the rogues from crime..!"
"Brilliant!" Sota exclaimed. "I vote for reform!"
"Shhh!" Yamato hissed again.
"That's ridiculous," Yuma said scathingly. "They've been extorting the villagers themselves, why would they suddenly help them? It's daft."
"Sorry Erisu," Kiyomi paused as though her words were causing her pain, "but I agree with this tosspot. I can't see the lab rats having a change of heart."
"There's something else..." Kakashi said darkly, his face inclined towards the clearing again. "Why haven't they collected last night's supplies yet?"
Erisu hadn't considered this and as she followed his gaze back to the camp another thought arose. "Maybe they can't."
"They do appear weak," Yamato caught on, "sickly even..."
"Well, we haven't a clue as to what kind of horrors they endured during their captivity, nor what sort of side effects may have been caused by Orochimaru-sama's experiments," Erisu said as she peered analytically at the targets. "They could be very ill indeed for all we know." She glanced back at Kakashi, trying to guess his thoughts on the matter. "I'd like to meet with them. Talk to them, examine them."
"And blow our cover?" Kiyomi's eyes produced sparks. "You can't be serious!"
"Shhh!"
"I might be able to convince them to aid the villagers," Erisu said more insistently, "and if I fail and they attack the rest of you can take them out from the safety of the trees."
"That's so risky it's downright stupid," Yuma sneered.
"It's dangerous," Sota agreed, "but Erisu is the most persuasive person I know. If there's a chance to change what side they're on..."
"It's not our job to solve everyone's problems from Konoha to the fucking North!" Yuma snapped.
"Shhh!"
"Let's just kill them and get the hell out of here! I don't know about the rest of you darlings but I don't want to crouch in the woods for the rest of my life."
"I won't stand by and let you murder..."
Erisu had no ears for the rest of the team's bickering. "Kakashi-sama?" she queried, attention on Kakashi and Kakashi alone. "Can I please speak with them?"
"Drop the 'sama', would you?" He sighed heavily and turned his dark grey eye to her at last. "Do you actually think you can persuade them to completely reverse their loyalties?"
"We owe it to everyone to at least try."
"Do you really trust them not to kill you on the spot?" He asked in an undertone.
"I don't trust them at all," she replied, "but I trust you implicitly."
He held her gaze evenly and she could tell that behind his sleepy eye he was doing some very quick thinking.
"Yuma," he said, his eye still on Erisu. "How many are there?"
The dark haired man honed his Dōjutsu and scanned the clearing with his seemingly sightless eyes.
"Thirteen," he replied after a moment, "twelve around the fire and one other beneath the lean-to."
"Good!" Kiyomi said. "Two for each of us! Doggy-san can take out the Lean-To Target and Yusha doesn't get one cause he's afraid of getting a job done."
"'Doggy-san'?" Pakkun growled.
"A pair of kunai per person and they'll all be dead before you can say 'discombobulated debauchery'." She smiled in satisfaction.
"Why the hell would anyone say that?" Yuma asked her coldly.
"Because its fun to say," she said as though it were obvious.
"Kakashi?" Erisu whispered so the others wouldn't hear. "You have to let me try."
He continued to search her eyes for a few agonizingly long heartbeats.
"Alright," he said at last. "You and Yamato will approach them while the rest of us keep watch, ready to intervene with non-lethal force." He turned to Yamato. "Anything suspicious and you bind them straight away, understand?"
Yamato's jaw tightened but he voiced no complaints, only nodding. Kiyomi looked completely flabbergasted.
"Kiyomi and Yuma flank them to the east," Kakashi instructed, "Yusha, you come west with me. Pakkun and Sota, stay here."
"Woah there honey," Kiyomi said pointing at Kakashi as if he was pulling her leg. "I don't mean to undermine your authority but is Reiketsu Kakashi really getting cold feet about killing a couple degenerates?" She was smiling as if this were all a prank. "I mean, you're actually going to issue orders to take them out, right?"
But Kakashi didn't have to answer as Yuma did in his stead.
"This is why you haven't been made captain of your own team, Kiyomi," he sad quietly and Erisu detected that he was actually sympathetic in regards to this fact. "You're too quick to kill. You killed Hiroki when he was the only one who could explain his betrayal and you're so keen to draw blood that you're willing to challenge a direct order from a superior."
"Excuse me?" She puffed up like a blowfish and looked prepared to set him on fire. "I wasn't-you're just-I cant even-"
"Your temper is going to get you in serious trouble one of these days," he told her.
"My temper?" Her fists crackled with fiery chakra. "Bitch please, you don't know the first thing about my temper!"
"Oh come on." He looked at her almost pityingly. "You were itching to attack Yuki back at the hospital weren't you? Lucky Erisu intervened or Sota here might be short of a mother."
In a flash of metal Kiyomi had drawn her kodachi and aimed a blow for Yuma's throat. There was a chiming of blade on blade as Kakashi blocked her with a kunai just in time.
"That's enough," he said in a dangerous whisper. "From all of you." His cold eye slid from Kiyomi to Yuma and back again. "You're not a couple of academy brats, you're Jōnin. Act like it. Otherwise the Hokage might hear about your behaviour in my report."
Kiyomi slowly withdrew her sword, eyes wide with fear, and wordlessly sheathed the blade. Yuma was perspiring, Byakugan pulsating. He'd clearly not expected her to attack him. Sota also appeared shaken, his black eyes flicking from one teammate to the other in shock.
"After that unprecedented display..." Kakashi stowed away his knife but was still burning with vexation. "...I think Yuma should stay here with Pakkun instead and Sota can join Kiyomi on the east flank, since he's the only one I'm certain she won't murder."
Kiyomi was simply staring at him as though afraid for her life.
"Anyone else feel like dragging this little side quest out any longer than necessary?" Kakashi asked icily. "No? Good."
"We'll be sure to move in at the first sign of danger," Sota murmured to Erisu reassuringly.
"I'm not afraid," she told him honestly, "not when you guys have my back." She lowered her voice. "I know Hot-Blooded-Kiyomi wouldn't let them harm a hair on my head."
He grinned sheepishly and glanced over at the tall woman anxiously. "Yeah. Hot blooded, hot headed.."
"Hot bodied?" Erisu suggested.
His eyes snapped back to hers in alarm. "Oh shut up."
She giggled. "Don't worry about me though. I'll have Yamato-sempai with me."
He clasped her on the shoulder and the team divided. Yamato was tense beside her, his dark possum eyes fixed below. Kiyomi was no longer seething, Kakashi's anger seemed to have doused her flames so to speak. She didn't blame her, he was terrifying when triggered.
"Alright," Yamato said quietly as there came a glint of light reflected on metal from the east, "Kakashi-sempai is in place." After a brief interval there was another glimmer to the west. "And Kiyomi-san as well. Let's go."
He lead the way down the slope and as the emerged from the undergrowth both he and Erisu raised their hands to show they meant no harm.
"Good morning!" Erisu called, deftly moving ahead of her tense and anxious superior.
The rogue closest to them lifted his head in alarm and Erisu nearly halted at the sight of his face.
"Oh no..." Yamato murmured from just behind her.
The glazed and sunken looking eyes of the escaped test subject were large and a sort of caramel colour as they settled on the approaching shinobi, but his features... He was no older than fourteen.
"Wh-who are you?" he asked in a croaky voice that caused goosbumps to immediately spread over Erisu's skin. Those caramel eyes flickered over them vaguely, resting briefly on Yamato's head guard. "Ninjas..?"
"I'm Erisu and this is my comrade, Yamato," she told the boy as the two of them neared the fire. "We're from Konoha."
"Konoha..." he repeated though his face was blank as though he'd never heard of it. "What do you want?"
"We happened upon you," Yamato said calmly though his eyes were sliding around the clearing with obvious unrest. "...thought we'd introduce ourselves."
The boy scoffed derisively; he wasn't fooled.
"What might we call you?" Erisu asked politely though she couldn't help but notice that the other shapes had barely even reacted to their arrival, some seemed completely unaware of their presence.
He was still eyeing her distrustfully but said, "Haru."
"It's a pleasure to make you acquaintance, Haru-san," Erisu edged even closer. She could now make out that his lips were chapped and puffy purple circles surrounded his eyes. "Might we join you? It's very chilly today and we've been on the road for some time."
Haru wrapped his arms around himself, tugging his cloak tight as if trying to shield himself from harm. He gave her the shortest of nods. Erisu led the way to the fireside and lowered herself onto a lichen covered log, aware of Haru's eyes trailing over her kunai holster and the chainmail visible at the neck of her kimono. She self consciously adjusted Kakashi's scarf.
Yamato sank onto the log beside her and a girl sitting next to Haru glanced up at them warily. She looked to be only about twelve years old and her pallid face was framed by two curtains of lank black hair.
"This is Sara-chan," Haru told them nodding towards the tiny girl who mumbled a greeting that was barely audible.
"Good morning," Erisu greeted her kindly, "are you alright? Only you look a bit under the weather..."
Sara recoiled with increasing caution.
"It's alright," Erisu said softly, "I'm a healer. If you're unwell I might be able to help."
Haru looked at her with renewed interest. "You're a doctor?"
"A medical ninja," she specified with a small smile. "I spent some time working in the emergency trauma ward in my village's hospital so I've seen and treated a wide variety of injuries and ailments."
Haru and Sara exchanged a meaningful look and Erisu detected a flicker of hope emanate from them both.
"Are you in need of medicine?" Erisu asked kindly.
"If you're really a healer..." Sara began in a small voice that sounded very similar to the raspy mewl of a kitten.
"It sounds too good to be true," Haru interjected, his eyes narrowed again with distrust. "How exactly did you find us?"
Erisu could feel Yamato prickling uneasily beside her but she knew the only way to earn their trust was through honesty.
"The truth is we were in the nearby village," she told them, careful to keep her voice free of blame, "a kindly old man told us about your arrangement at the shrine to Ojizō-sama..."
Sara's face drained of what little colour it had and Haru tried to straighten up defensively but he quickly slumped forward again clutching his abdomen.
"It's alright," Erisu reassured them again, "we've just stopped by to ask for your side of the story." She glanced over at the lean-to where the supplies from the village had been stacked haphazardly. "You've been requesting food?"
"We were starving!" Haru said in justification, his voice hoarse and strained. "We'd just escaped and-" he cut himself off with a look that he'd said too much.
"Don't worry, we already know where you were before." She reached out and though he recoiled initially, Haru let her touch his hand. "There's no shame in what happened to you, I hope you know that. It wasn't your fault."
"But..." Haru searched her face. "The things we did while we were with him..."
"You need to rise above that," Yamato said unexpectedly. "You don't need to be defined by what he did to you or what he made you into."
Erisu turned to her comrade and saw a haunted look in his eyes.
"You..." Haru was staring at him as though transfixed. "...He did it to you too, didn't he..?"
Sara was gazing intently at Yamato as well and another boy peered out from under his heavy hood, keen to hear the shinobi's response.
"He kidnapped me as a small child," Yamato told them in a voice so low it wouldn't carry to where the rest of the team members were stationed. "I don't know who my parents were or what they named me. My earliest memories are of the experiments he did on me. When he was discovered he left me and the other children behind and fled, believing us to have died from the tests." He paused and Erisu could tell that he'd rarely spoken of this to anyone. "I alone survived and was taken in by Konoha but even after-"
"They still saw you as a weapon," Haru finished for him, his caramel eyes steady and knowing. "I never really thought that there were others but of course there were..." He coughed raggedly and wiped some sweat from his brow with the back of his shaking hand.
"He took us as children too," Sara whispered. "I remember my mother screaming when they came for us..."
"Can you recall where he took you from?" Erisu asked her as gently as possible.
"Of course." Sara met her gaze and Erisu could feel every ounce of the girl's loneliness and fear. "That's why we came back as soon as we escaped."
"You don't mean...?"
"Yeah." Haru let out another harsh and painful sounding cough. "The village you just came from is our birthplace."
"You're the lost children that have been mourned at the shrine?" Erisu asked in a whisper. "Why are you extorting your own families?"
"You have to understand," Haru pleaded weakly, "when Orochimaru-sama died his servants scattered and left us in our cages. There was no one there to feed us, we were starving... We managed to pick the lock to our cell with a splinter of bone and escaped. But we were too scared to go back to the village..."
"He turned us into monsters," Sara said faintly. "We couldn't let them see what we'd become, or tell them what we'd done..."
"So what then?" Yamato wondered. "You decided to threaten them instead? Release legions of the undead upon them every night?"
"The scarecrows weren't sent by us," Haru said fervently and he was wracked by another bout of coughing. "We just pretended they were so that the people would fear us. They were just leftovers from Kabuto-san's experiments."
"Kabuto..." Yamato's eyes stretched wide. Clearly that name meant something to him. "You met Kabuto? You spoke to him?"
Sara looked more uneasy than ever. "He was the one who did all the tests. I always thought he seemed so nice..."
"What about Sasuke?" Yamato asked with urgency. "Did you ever meet a dark haired boy, just a bit older than you, who was being trained by Orochimaru?"
Sara and Haru looked at each other for a long moment before Haru said, "he used to come to the hideout sometimes, he'd make us fight him..."
"His eyes..." Sara whispered before she doubled up with a fit of coughing herself. That was all she needed to say for them to know that she had really seen the Uchiha boy.
"The hideout..." Yamato quickly produced a map from his utility pouch. "Can you mark it on this map?"
Haru considered him for a moment. "Why?"
"We want to make sure that what happened to you won't happen again," Erisu told him. "And we ourselves are looking for a child that was taken from us by Orochimaru-sama."
The boy continued to weigh them carefully with his caramel eyes before nodding slowly. "I think I can," he said at last. "Let me see the map."
Yamato handed it over with bated breath and they watched in silence as Haru traced the paper with a trembling hand. Then he tapped a spot several leagues west of the village.
"It's around here," he told them and Erisu noted that his voice seemed to be getting even weaker. "The entrance is pretty close to an abandoned grain silo." As he handed the map back, Yamato marked the spot promptly and then carefully stowed the parchment away.
"Thank you, Haru-san," Erisu murmured. "That could help a lot of people."
"I just betrayed Orochimaru-sama," Haru said uncomfortably. "Even after everything..." Sara rested her head against his shoulder comfortingly. "After all the tests and all the things that we were told to do to demonstrate our powers..." he trailed off and mopped the sweat from his face with his sleeve.
"The things that happened to you and the things he made you do don't have to be what defines you," Erisu told them firmly. "Like Yamato-sempai said: you can rise above it."
"But how?" Haru asked desperately. "How can we change? what can we do to make up for the terrible stuff that we..." He had to cut himself off as he started hacking into his hand again.
"Go home," she said softly once his coughs had subsided. "Instead of blackmailing the village into feeding you, move back and help them rebuild. Put your past behind you and start again. If it's too hard to tell them who you are then don't. That can wait until you're ready. Instead of tearing people down the way Orochimaru-sama does you can help them grow and flourish. Break the cycle of abuse and do better than those before you."
Haru stared deep into her eyes, and whatever he was searching for he seemed to have found it.
"Just like that..?"
"Just like that," she confirmed. "I believe that you and the others can make this world a better place, Haru. All you have to do is try."
Sara was looking at Yamato. "Is she right, sir?" The lank haired girl asked in a quavering voice. "Is it possible to be good even after... after what happened?"
Yamato held her gaze. "It is." His voice was low but certain. "For a long time I let myself be an object that carried out the will of others. What else did I know? But I found my centre, and now I work tirelessly everyday to serve the village that saved me and make it stronger and more righteous than before. There's always a chance to change."
Sara seemed convinced.
"We could go home..." She whispered, turning to Haru hopefully. "We can eat properly cooked meals instead of bland miso and that spoiled rice. Imagine... Barbeque pork fresh off the grill."
Haru chuckled weakly. "I don't know how you can even think about food, Sara-chan," he said. "I'm still feeling sick from breakfast."
Erisu suddenly felt a prickle of unease as she realized the emotions around her seemed to be fading. There was an unpleasant retching noise coming from the rogue laying beneath the lean-to.
"Haru-san," she said as her gaze swept around the circle of huddled teens, "what kind of sickness do you have?"
"Some kind of flu," he said vaguely. "We've all been puking and shaking. And Asahi was having difficulty breathing last night."
Erisu eyed the boy that Haru had indicated was Asahi and felt her heart starting to accelerate.
"Have you been having any headaches or tremors?" she asked as her eyes flicked back to Haru. She spotted his hands trembling. "Seizures?" She hesitated. "...casualties?"
"Yeah... all of that." Haru told her in a small voice. "Some of the younger kids didn't make it. Ryuu-kun..."
"Erisu-san, what is it" Yamato asked in a low voice beside her but she didn't have enough information yet to answer.
Haru was squinting his eyes against the light of the dim fire as if it were a blazing bonfire. Beside him, Sara got unsteadily to her feet.
"Where are you going?" Yamato demanded tensely.
"I need to puke," she answered shortly. Stumbling away to the edge of the glade, the girl doubled over and retched loudly.
"How long has this flu lasted?" Erisu asked Haru softly and his bleary eyes raised to hers with some difficulty.
Struggling to maintain focus on her he said in that chillingly strained voice, "pretty much as long as we've been free." He looked over at the hunched boy across the fire from him. "Isn't that right, Asahi?"
Asahi didn't respond, his head bowed and face lost beneath the folds of his hood. Haru's brows knitted nervously.
"Asahi?" He repeated a bit louder.
Yamato and Erisu exchanged an uneasy look and Yamato cautiously approached the huddled figure. He gently reached out with his gloved hand and pulled back the boy's hood. Haru let out a strangled cry as Erisu met the glazed, dead eyes of the boy. His youthful face was already drained of colour and his skin was pasty and damp with perspiration. A stream of red tinged foam was drying around his mouth and chin.
Haru stumbled over to the Asahi and shook him desperately but it was no use. Yamato looked around the circle and worked his jaw agitatedly. Following his surveying gaze Erisu saw that the other kids barely had enough energy to register that their friend was dead. Yamato's fists kept clenching and unclenching as yet another of the rogues keeled over and hurled all over their own feet. She could tell Yamato wanted to call the whole thing off.
Suddenly possessed by a hypothesis, Erisu opened the smoky pots hanging over the dying fire. One contained the watery looking miso she'd noticed them drinking but the other was full of the rice they'd apparently been eating before the team had arrived. Steam issued from the pot and she wafted the fumes towards her. One deep inhale told her everything she needed to know and she quickly slammed the pot shut and pulled her scarf up to cover her nose and mouth. She elbowed Yamato and he covered his face with a handkerchief, eyeing her in confused concern.
"What is it?" He asked her quietly, leaning in close so the others wouldn't overhear.
"Poison," she hissed back, "their food is full of pesticides. That's why Sara thought it'd turned. They must've tasted the binding agent."
"Pesticides?" He echoed with a glance back at the unmoving form of Asahi who's hair was plastered to his chalky face with sweat. "Pesticides did that?"
"They're manufactured to kill," she said. "At high enough concentrations they can do the same to humans as they do to locusts and rats."
Just then another boy suddenly fell to the ground, frothing at the mouth. She rushed over to the convulsing boy and turned him onto his side to keep him from choking on his vomit. But her stomach was dropping as she realized that not only was the boy showing signs of neural degradation but that he was also experiencing Hypercapnic respiratory failure. She had neither the equipment nor the experience to deal with a poisoning of this scale...
Yamato was staring around in shock and horror as more of the rogues started to gag, cough, and wheeze more severely.
"Which is?" He asked as though he didn't want to know the answer.
"In this case..." she looked up sharply just as Sara collapsed into the puddle of her own stomach contents. "...destroy the nervous system and rupture the internal organs, particularly the lungs." She was trembling as the fear of every kid washed over her in a terrible wave. "I need Yuma-sempai's help!'
"Yuma-san!" Yamato bellowed, causing Haru to stare up at them in terror.
"What's happening?" he cried. "We can't lose anymore! I can't..." he choked and gagged. Erisu was so distraught she barely noticed that the boy she was holding was already dead.
"...you must have-" Haru had started to shake uncontrollably. "-must have medicine-" he dry heaved, sweating even more profusely, and reached for a jug of water but Erisu quickly kicked it out of his reach.
Missing the jug, Haru slumped onto the leaf strewn ground and stared up at Erisu with bloodshot eyes. She hurried over to him, dropped to her knees and, still covering her face, gave him her own canteen of uncontaminated water. While he drank she administered medical ninjutsu and took his pulse. Panic was rising in her chest as she realized the inevitable. The neurotoxin had ruptured the capillaries and air sacs in his lungs. Without proper treatment...
"Haru," she said hastily as she rummaged through her med-kit with increasing urgency. But to her mounting hysteria she realized she was out of atropine. "Haru!" she said again as he vomited up the water, now mingled with blood. He was haemorrhaging.
She turned her wide eyes on Yamato who was still staring around with the cloth pressed tightly over his face. Yuma and Pakkun were dashing over to them, Yuma's hands already glowing with healing chakra.
"What's going on?" He demanded. "What's happened to them?"
"Pesticides in their food," Yamato explained rapidly, "the villagers seem to have tried to take things into their own hands."
"And warfarin," Erisu added as Haru vomited more blood. "There's anticoagulants in it too-rat poison-he's bleeding internally!"
"Erisu-san," Yamato said as a girl keeled over, falling face first into the fire and knocking the poisoned rice everywhere. "Do something! An antidote?"
The miso splashed over the blackened logs and there was a loud hiss of steam as the fire went out.
"But Yamato-sempai," she managed through a sob of helplessness, "I don't have any left! I need a concentration of Vitamin K to stop the effects of the warfarin, which isn't the sort of thing one generally keeps for first aid, he's lost so much blood that he's going to need a transfusion, and without knowing what kind of pesticide..."
"You mean-" he had heaved the girl out of the embers but only to realize she too was dead, her turquoise eyes gazing blankly at the sky and a thin stream of pinkish foam trickling from her mouth. Her pale pink hair was faded and brittle as straw as Yamato lowered her to the ground. She looked uncannily akin to Sakura. "-these kids..." he stared at the girl and his dark eyes were swimming with disbelief. "...they're all going to die?"
Beside him Yuma and Pakkun could only look on in shock.
"It's what we deserve," Haru gurgled, foaming at the mouth. "We let ourselves be tools, weapons. Even after Orochimaru-sama was gone-" He dry heaved again and drew a rattling, agonized breath "-we still kept doing evil in his name. Terrorizing our own village..."
Erisu shook her head and tried to find words to console him but there was nothing she could say. Instead it was Yamato who spoke.
"We'll make sure your bodies are returned to your village," he said faintly, "you'll be buried by your families at least."
"No parent should have to bury their child." Haru gagged. "We should have gone back to them long ago... should've made amends..."
"They'll know that you wanted to," Erisu whispered as Haru slumped against her, seizing and coughing. "What were your names..?"
Haru's head dropped into her lap as blood started to ooze from his nose. "Asahi," he whispered, "Touma, Ikari, Ichika, Kaito..." He coughed again and more sudsy blood issued from his mouth, spattering the front of Erisu's kimono. "...Itsuki, Ryusei, Yui, Reo, Takumi..." Tears started leaking from his eyes but Erisu held his gaze, seeing her own half-concealed face reflected in his caramel irises. "...Sara."
"And Haru," she finished for him gently as his expression went blank. The last thrashing youth stilled a few feet away and Erisu bowed her head in defeat. All thirteen of them... every one of the lost children... they were all dead at the hands of their unknowing village.
火
