She was looking straight at him, and therefore could easily tell that he had zoned out from the circumstances around him. She sighed softly and decided to listen to what he had to say.

"The only reason that I am doing what he has asked is because I owe him a great debt. He asked, that in repayment, that I assassinate Kasumi for him. Recently his thoughts have been rather distant, and in his way of expressing them even more so," he turned his head so he could glance at the young shinobi lying on the table. "His patience is waning with your clan. When I saw him in the forest before this happened, he was treating me as though I was one of his students. His thoughts aren't straight,"

"It seems as though you're just making excuses for him," she protested, running a hand through her lavender locks. "Even still, if what you say is true to the last degree, then what debt do you owe him that is big enough for him to get you to do his clan's work? I mean, that is a big thing, to get somebody else from a different clan to do your clan's work,"

"He realises that. I thought that he would have interpreted it as weakness, but apparently to him it proves the clan he has other allies, which equals strength. I don't quite understand the logic behind it, but he hasn't told me more. I have to do my task without asking questions," The expression on his face was rather bitter, as was his tone by this stage. "A good little errand-boy,"

"You haven't answered my question," she snapped. "What debt do you owe him? I mean, Hayate. Come on,"

"He saved me from a fate worse then death, in the literal sense," he said softly. "I had been caught by a rival clan to my own. They had already tried to steal the Dragon Sword once, and managed to capture me through a fault of my own. Anyway, this time they decided that they would not combat me in the original sense, sending precious ninjas out to try and assassinate me that way. It didn't work the last time. They chained me up and were going to cut me up,"

"Excuse me?" she asked, surprised. "Do you mean cut up as in amputate, etcetera?"

"Quite accurate to put it that way," he stated simply. "Death would be fine, but torture I have no stomach for, especially when I am in the victim's position, rather then vice versa. Either way, I don't know how Hayate found out that they had caught me, but he came in before they managed to do anything serious, unchained me and saved me, I suppose,"

"So he wants a favour in return?" she asked incredulously. "What a prick," she added as an afterthought.

"That he may be, but I will do it. Anything rather then being… a limbless torso in that cell," he said; eyes downcast. Her own brown eyes widened.

"You couldn't keep somebody alive with their limbs chopped off, that's impossible," she said. She couldn't even believe the notion, let alone the lack of morality it would take to do such a thing. Even she couldn't do that to anybody, leave them as a limbless torso. Not even Kasumi and that was saying something.

"I beg to differ. There are ways. Decadent ways, but still ways,"

"Worse then even doing it in the first place?" she asked, still in shock. "Wait," she mused out aloud. "Don't want to hear it. Shit. I guess kissing Hayate's feet is better then that. Anything is better then that,"

"Exactly," he said, spitting out the word as though it tasted bad. "So that's how I have managed to be caught in Hayate's conniving game of killing his sister," he stopped, and touched his left shoulder lightly. "He came just in time,"

"Can we change the subject?" she asked. He nodded blankly.

Little Japanese ninja history, the above could have happened! (Lovely, ain't it?) And ninjas used to use claws, too. So just when we thought that all these ninjas were nice… (lol)