"Do I really smell like honey?"
Hotaru blushed at Kiba's compliment of her scent.
But now wasn't the time for flattery.
"I gotta stay focused," she said, shaking herself out of it. "One wrong move, and I'm dead. I have to take that Aburame out before the Dog Boy catches me. I can't take them both on at the same time."
She wasn't interested in the dog ninja anyway.
She'd come here for Aburame.
Because whether her target knew it or not, this was war.
And only one of them would walk away in the end.
Hotaru sighed, leaning back against the tree that housed her stakeout. Nerve-wrecked but hellbent on completing her mission.
There was no backing out now.
He has to die...If I don't kill him, he'll just keep killing more of us...I'm not just a daughter of the leading family now. I have to be useful. I have to be brave, no matter how much fighting him scares me.
But did her target know she was there?
Why did he stop walking so suddenly, when that beetle landed on him?
Did those annoying, itchy little bastards blow her cover?
"That's gotta be the Kikaichū. Then he's definitely an Aburame," she confirmed. "But he's so...'bug-ish'...How could this dorky little beetle kisser really be a threat to our village?"
She looked around at the fog darkening around her, making it harder to track her prey.
"Is he using genjutsu to throw me off? Hachimitsu Sensei forgot to mention that in my training...I can't lose track of him. He's a Leaf ninja, which means he's stronger than I am. I gotta bring everything I got to this fight...Because killing Shino Aburame is my only way back home."
And the sooner she did that, the sooner she could prove her innocence for a crime she didn't commit.
Of course, it wouldn't be easy.
She'd never killed anyone before.
She was a beekeeper, not a real shinobi.
What had this Shino Aburame done anyway, that she had to risk her life to take his?
"Never show him mercy. The Aburame clan is your enemy. Expect no mercy from him either," Hachimitsu Sensei's voice buzzed back into her head. "Prove your strength, and you can return to the clan. But if you are still stupid enough to lose this fight, don't even think about summoning me!
"Take this bee jar. She will help you track him down. Your only strategy is to ambush him. With your level of training, do not make the mistake of thinking you can face Shino directly in battle. After all, I fought the Aburame in the Iwa-Konohagakure war, and a scared little honeybee like you won't stand a chance against him."
Trembling to prove herself, Hotaru unwound the bee jar, where a golden tracking bee buzzed inside.
"I am not a scared little honey bee," she thought. "I am Hotaru Kamizuru, daughter of the honorable bee clan, and I will show that Aburame no mercy."
Releasing the lid on her bee jar, she coaxed the tracking bumble to battle, its fluttering blonde wings illuminating Hotaru's golden eyes.
"You know what to do," she said to the bee. "I'm counting on you."
And with her orders, the bumble bee darted after Shino, tracing a path for Hotaru to follow him in the thickening fog.
"Got him," She pinpointed the Aburame's location.
With her kunai ready, Hotaru jumped out of hiding, free falling into the fog to take Shino out.
But when her feet touched the forest floor, Shino Aburame was gone.
Vanished without a trace into the mist.
What's going on here?
Hotaru wondered, scanning her surroundings suspiciously.
Where did he go?
And then she heard them.
The violent buzzing of 1000 warrior bees coming right at her. 1000 angry bees of 1 mind, all echoing a single word.
Kill.
And she knew enough about beekeeping to know she was about to become a bee's lunch.
Instinct for survival took over.
Forgetting about Shino and her mission, Hotaru ran.
Even though she knew good and well the bamboo forest wouldn't protect her from the swarm.
These bees were killers.
Biting into her skin like 1000 shuriken at once.
A swarm of yellow jackets aggressively trapping her in their circle, making it impossible for her to escape as the insects went in for the kill.
With every bee sting, Hotaru felt dizzy, her burning veins rushing with bee poison.
"This is the Kamizuru 1000 Bee Stings Technique," she thought, as her vision became darker and blurry. "But how? Why would a beekeeper attack another beekeeper?...Is this really the end for me?...I was so close...I almost had..."
But no matter how hard Hotaru fought to stay awake, the potent bee venom knocked her out cold.