Chapter Thirty Eight:
"Well, that was… interesting." Kakashi narrated as they left the main gates.
"Interesting?" Sakura repeated incredulously.
"Interesting." he concluded, hiking the bag further up on his back.
"Really? I don't quite remember the elders asking you about your ovulation cycle."
"They already have my medical report." he dismissed with a wave of his hand.
"We were pretty much invited to start reproducing on the floor in front of them." Sakura responded, mouth dropped open with the audacity of the mere memory.
"I always have performed better with an audience…" He tilted his head as if pondering the idea. "Ow." The fist to his bicep was not gentle. "I meant with my negotiations."
"Negotiations?!" Sakura repeated, picking up her walking speed to keep pace with him. "You didn't even say anything when they started asking about how often we were having sex."
"But I did get us approved for immediate leave on this mission." he bartered.
"They want to appeal the medical board to have my chakra controlled contraception revoked."
"Well, you won't be young forever."
"Are you getting paternal or something?"
"Ah, suicide missions always get me this way." he joked, slinging an arm around her shoulders.
"You're insufferable." But despite her words, she leaned into him. "At least Tsunade agreed to the mission."
"She wasn't happy." Kakashi noted.
"It was still quite early." Sakura defended.
"Could be a diplomatic nightmare either way." Kakashi sympathised.
They were heading to the last civilian village where comms had last reported in from. The idea was to follow his proposed route until they came across new information or the idol itself.
But, nin had all agreed to stay out of these civilian villages unless personally invited. They were in breach of a treaty just stepping foot inside their land.
Hence why they had a set of civilian clothes in their packs and were hoping to blend in as travelling merchants.
"Oh." What greeted Kakashi and Sakura at the first civilian village was a distinct lack of anything.
Empty houses next to empty farm lands. Empty streets and empty shops.
Not a soul to be seen, not a whisper on the wind.
No laughter, no children playing noisily, no haggle over prices.
"He last sent comms to say he was staying in the guest room above the bakery." Kakashi advised, turning their gazes down the streets.
They followed their feet further into the ghost town. Past the lined houses, past the bikes abandoned at the side of the street, past the wilting flowerbeds that only the bees visited.
The bakery stood there with door wide open, bread on the shelves without a shop keep in sight.
"If this was the idol… where are the bodies? The blood?" Sakura asked, turning into the shop and the wares in the window. "It's still soft, it hasn't been like this long." she noted, fingers gently squeezing the merchandise on sale.
"Last confirmed comms was 39 hours ago." Kakashi spoke, taking himself up the outdoor steps to the top floor apartment.
Sakura followed behind, eyes on the empty streets whilst Kakashi broke the lock and gained entry.
There wasn't much to comment on, it was a basic room; no knick knacks or suggestion there was anybody living there. As nin often perfected the practice of.
"There's a leaflet." Sakura offered, lifting the top coloured paper with handwriting on. A scoff escaped her as she read, dropping the paper back to the desk where she found it. "Rub a magic totem to get a prosperous year." she quoted, eyes cutting at the paper like it had personally offended her.
"So someone is purposefully targeting the civilian villages then." Kakashi summed, his fingers lifting the pages of newspapers the nin before them had collated in a pile.
"The textbooks suggested sacrifices." Sakura began. "Civilians would be easy targets unable to defend themselves against anything."
"Unquestioning." Kakashi added. "It's been hard times." Kakashi held up newspapers articles to evidence his point, flooding has destroyed farm land. There was little left. "They'd be desperate for any promise of good fortune."
"So how do we combat this?" Sakura asked, leaning her hips against the desk, her kimono parting at her thigh. Kakashi gave her a pointed look. "Oh shut up, it's the only civilian clothes I have that let me fight properly."
"Hm." He took steps closer to her, making no attempt to hide his blatant staring at her long leg as she showcased them. "We need to intercept."
"And if we knew where whoever was doing this was going, that would be great."
"North." Kakashi guessed, stepping into her personal space.
"Wild arse guess?"
"If farm land has been wiped out and crops have died, it will have had a knock on effect to their trade routes. There's only a small distance between a northern town that breeds horses and cattle."
"If they're targeting down and out towns desperate for luck, they'd be a good choice."
"And he's making a festival out of it." Kakashi nodded to the flyer she'd found. "It's a good way to get the whole town at once."
"So we go north?"
His covered face crept closer, his nose pressing against her forehead to get to her to tilt her head back, to let him ghost his masked lips over her cheek. She angled her head to meet his lips. Although not bare, she felt the warmth from the domestic gesture. Reassurance, comfort.
"Nothing reckless. Yes?"
"Nothing reckless." she agreed softly, chasing another kiss before the job could take back over.
But alone together in a dead town, shielded from any eyes by the small apartment of a baker who may never be laid to rest, she valued his kiss. It was cold to think of, it was upsetting, but Kakashi's kiss made her want to forget where she was, the mission she was on. The reason why it was her here now. The fact that it was a dead man's apartment they stood in.
"North."
North only took them a few hours at civilian walking pace, they kept the ruse of being married traders as ordinary as other folk, dragging around a cart of chakra created supplies.
But there was nobody meeting them on the roads.
No foot traffic, no nins in the trees.
Only several birds joined them along the path of their trip, far too few for the area and time of year.
An unsettling ill ease grew in them both as they progressed further towards the town.
Something was wrong.
"We're walking into another ghost town, aren't we?" Sakura asked rhetorically, adjusting the sit of the dress against her shoulder.
"Possibly." Kakashi agreed.
"It's just low." Sakura muttered to herself. "Slaughtering civilians like cattle, no ability to defend themselves, no knowledge of what they are-"
"Wait." Kakashi interrupted her with a hand extended across her path, meeting her chest like a defensive arm bar.
She turned to him with alert eyes but he was halted with a cocked head she knew well. He was listening for something she couldn't hear.
"Death?" she whispered at a guess, readying her stance for a fight.
"Festivities." he responded, releasing his posture but none of the tension yet.
"Festivities?" she questioned, straining to hear what she knew she couldn't without chakra enhancement.
"Cheering." he expanded. "Merriment. Betting." he continued as the auditory information kept coming.
"Using the same rouse as before." Sakura guessed. "Luring them in with a festival so they'll touch the idol." Sakura made to push on full steam, to intercept the revelries, to stop the men, women and children from passing on their lives to someone with a god complex and a religious deviance that demanded a loyalty payment of death.
Again, a hand stopped her, this one was firm but gentle.
Sakura turned again to her partner, the one stopping her progress, stopping her from saving lives. And she saw his eyes. Pools of sincerity, ripples of unspoken emotion.
"Oh." she paused, letting him draw her close. It could not just be festivities that await them, it could be their own deaths. And Kakashi wanted to save a memory to take into the beyond with him.
Sakura closed the distance, eyes fluttering shut as she tracked her lips to his. The mask was down, the cover off and she met him lip to lip.
It was needy, it was sorrowful, and as he moved his tongue to the parting of her mouth, it was an edge desperate. Something to savour.
Her hand was on his chest and she could feel the thud of his heartbeat, the danger that awaited them as both an intrigue and a harrowing fear.
They lived for it, and this time, they just might die for it.
Sakura broke off first, the emotion tight in her throat. She rested her head against the hand on his chest, pretending she had herself under control, pretending she hadn't been drenched in terror.
But Shinobi didn't say goodbye.
Konoha didn't send them out expecting a failure.
They'd fight.
"I'm right here with you. All the way." His words were purposeful, they built up her walls.
They enabled her to straighten up, commit him in this moment as a beacon of light and strength into her mind and soul. She used them to take her steps towards the village, forcing herself not to run as she so desired to do.
They were met at the entrance by revellers, men and women dressed smartly, joyous and happy. They danced around each other with drinks in their hands, greeting the travellers with the different festivities on offer.
It was Sakura that asked first, Kakashi rested a hand on her hip like lazy old lovers, the other dragging their cart of wares.
"What's the festival in honour of?" she questioned the man who invited them to join the bets on the horse race.
"Would you believe we took in a stranger, he told us of an old god he worshipped, one so powerful he could save the village's horses." He grinned widely. "And he did. Laid a hand to one of the lame stallions we were going to put down, and he cured him. Right before our eyes."
"Saved the cows from disease." Another passerby added.
"The chickens started laying again." A woman offered as they passed her stringing up bunting from her home. "Praise his gods, he saved us all."
"He saved you?" Sakura asked, appearing as curious as a stranger would.
"Famine, disease, death. The village was looking at barely surviving the year. The animals hadn't had enough feed, we couldn't afford the medicine for the full herds, we were looking at ruin." The bookie continued. "And then he comes in like it was nothing but a trifle, rubbed his idol, spoke his words and everything has changed. Exactly as he said it would."
"How long has he been here?" Sakura continued, her nature demanding research instead of bulldozing into a situation.
"2 days?" the man guessed, only to have his words confirmed by another reveller in the street.
The path they walked led to more houses, barely held together by wood but still standing, past shops that barely had any items to sell. Windows boarded over, graves lining the edge of the grazing paddocks.
It looked and it smelled like a farm on its last legs, nothing to support it and falling into ruin and death. But it sounded like a town built on riches and love. Children were running around with toys made of sticks and string but they were happy.
Sakura felt a squeeze to her hip, fast and short, bringing her to the present.
"-said he'd share it with us." The man had continued his story as her attention had strayed. "We just needed to open our hearts to a new god and pray at his totem."
"And did you?" Sakura asked, already knowing the answer. Very few civilians would refuse such a life-saving turn around when offered.
"Of course we did, we weren't stupid. We'd seen what he could do with our own eyes. Every man, woman and child in the village is lining up for their turn to touch the statue of the god, to pray in his name. He said it was all we had to do to let him into our lives." The bookie stopped. "Ah, speaking of, there's my son, we best get in line to share in the glory of-"
"No." Sakura barked out, the child was barely 6 or 7 and she couldn't just let him willingly sacrifice himself.
"I think what my wife means-" Kakashi interrupted with a crooked smile and a nervous laugh "Is that she wants to see this statue herself. Hard time believing anything she hasn't seen." Kakashi smoothed over and the bookie pointed to the centre of the village. Kakashi bid him thanks and kept a firm hand on Sakura's hip.
"They're lambs to the slaughter." she hissed to him as soon as there was no-one dancing in earshot. "We need to stop them from touching that idol."
"No." Kakashi softly replied. "We need to stop whoever is moving this idol around."
"You want to wait, whilst they all line themselves up for death until we get to see this bastard?"
"You want to stop this from happening again, don't you?"
"I want to stop a 6 year old from dying." she whispered back.
"Hold your nerve. We need to keep our cover until we have a target." The words were easier said than done and as they turned the corner they saw the crowd in the square.
Kakashi felt her grip at his arm to hold herself back as the children ran to the front to lay their small hands on the bronze statue.
Just a pixie, barely a fairy in appearance, but the bronze idol was far from innocent.
She recognised it instantly. Had seen it in books, in nightmares, and now, once again, it was before her in reality.
It looked smaller than she remembered, yet it still terrified her.
She watched as parents lifted up their infants to take luck from the depiction of the god, babes no older than a few months pressing tiny digits to the cold metal.
Her fingers tightened on his presence, to keep her there to keep her mind from being thrown all the way back to that field where she felt hope die.
To the grassy area where she saw her team ripped apart by an idol exactly the same as the one before her now.
To that lone prison in her mind where she stumbled away covered in the blood of her teammates, carrying what was left of their bodies in seals that could bring no peace to any widows.
Warm fingers stroked over her own and with a flinch and a gasp she was back, a nin posing as a civilian in a village about to be murdered.
"Not yet." Kakashi whispered, his face turned to speak the words soft and easy into her hair. "We're finishing this properly."
"We need to stop this massacre." They had no idea what was going to befall them, blissfully happy whilst their demise was being plotted.
Sakura heard Kakashi's voice question a passing villager but only tuned in for the response.
"-The prophet? He's at the front, the one in the white."
Both nin focussed on the direction of the nod as the villager passed them.
Kakashi felt his partner tense, felt the exact moment she laid eyes on him.
"You know him?"
"He was our contact, the art dealer that asked us there." Sakura's words came out between clenched teeth. "He played us."
"Did he meet you?"
"Once or twice, mostly dealt with by our Captain. I didn't speak with him."
"Would he recognise you?" Kakashi continued.
"Guess we'll find out." Sakura's voice was a vow. To end this, for there to be no more death.
Kakashi could have stopped her, could have reassessed the situation for tactical advantages, but instead he did as he promised he would, and stayed by her side.
The cart disappeared from his hand like it was never there, the rouse gone, the chakra in him swirling ready for a fight. He could feel hers vibrating next to him, the anxiety, the giddiness, the crippling terror.
Kakashi watched, calculating as a villager spoke to the false messiah, the way the eyes of the conversing both touched on himself and Sakura. One with a smile to greet new friends, one with a dropped façade that crashed over his features before flashing back up with a forced calm.
"A story." The prophet announced suddenly, arms shot wide to encompass the audience before him.
Kakashi once again stepped a hand in front of his companion, halting her to assess what was unfurling before them. "Of those who did not see the light." The speaker held everyone's attention but his focus was very clearly to the pinkette. "The 13 who got away." Kakashi felt his partner tense, the 'story' being a slip of history, her history. "13 were invited to sit at my table, to greet our saviour." His hand went to the idol. "13 that were offered greatness and reward, eternal memory in the legends if they would only lend a hand to their future. They saw the glory before them, they saw what they could offer, but one voice spoke up to say it was too good to be true, it wasn't right." Murmurs of disapproval scattered around the villagers. "That voice started poisoning all the heaven before them. The voice plotted against our god. The voice took the totem that gave them all their riches and demanded to see the power inside, crushed it until nothing remained, and all bounty was void. A waste of life. Of spirit. The 13 that got away. All because of one voice of negativity; a non-believer that ruined it for so many."
The audience groaned their responses, a 'boo' started from the back and spreading forward.
And now, stood front and centre, the speaker truly grinned from ear to ear. He'd just made all attempts at them stopping any others from touching the idol completely useless.
"All I ask. All our god asks, is loyalty and you will be rewarded as I have been." He stepped back from the cheers and support.
"He's running." Sakura predicted, watching as he slid through the approaching hands, feet starting to move faster.
"Usual plan?" Kakashi offered as they skirted the outside of the crowds to follow him.
Usual plan was simple, 100% all guns firing, stop at nothing with a single aim in mind given hyperfocussed attention, no diversions allowed.
Sakura analysed her chance at getting rid of the idol in a split glance to it. They'd never be able to get to it safely, never mind remove it from the village.
"Yeah." she agreed and they took off at a run, aware of the eyes that turned on them as they chased down the prophet who was openly sprinting from the village.