Shinjou gasped slightly at the sight of the two of them. "A Hidden Leaf shinobi?" she questioned, looking at his headband which was still raised over his eye. "Kakashi of the Sharingan at that! Better cover up that eye of yours before you get any ideas." She snapped her fingers at the man standing behind him and immediately Kakashi couldn't see anything. He heard his headband fall to the ground as cloth was tied over his eyes.
"And… our favorite fox…" she drawled, smiling menacingly down at her. "My, my, Nayamae," she tsked. "You certainly have mixed yourself up with the wrong crowd. I thought Akito was joking!" she laughed. Her smile quickly faded. "He told me you were trying to play some kind of spy for Konoha, but I didn't think you would actually be able to get him arrested." She looked down at Nayamae, who was trying very hard to control her trembling.
"Well?!" Shinjou bellowed angrily. "What have you got to say for yourself? Playing the lap dog to the Hokage and playing spy with one of their best shinobi?" Kakashi heard a loud slap beside him. Nayamae muttered something that he couldn't make out. "I should have killed you long ago," Shinjou gritted, "but today is not your lucky day to die just yet." She snapped her fingers again and Kakashi was pulled up to his feet and forced to walk forward.
They were pushed along in relative silence, with only Shinjou's men cracking the occasional inappropriate joke. Kakashi wasn't sure of the exact path they took, but knew they had passed through a small creek and covered several miles over the mountains. His cold and wet feet were numb by the time they had finally reached Shinjou's home. He guessed it was early evening when they arrived. From what sounded like a very large doorway being opened, he imagined the building from Nayamae's memories that looked like a dojo, with its high walls and beautifully shingled roofs. Gravel crunched beneath their feet and then solid wood.
"Take them downstairs. You know what to do with her, but just tie him up somewhere for now. Don't remove his blindfold," he heard Shinjou say. "I'll be down there soon enough."
"No!" Nayamae cried, breaking her silence while struggling to free herself as she was dragged down a hall. Kakashi was pushed after her. "No, please! Shinjou! Come on! Let's talk first! Shinjou!" It was useless. Her cries didn't stop the men from dragging them down a set of stairs and into a cold stone basement. He didn't recall ever seeing this part of the house in her memories.
The metal sound of chains scraping on stone floor became loud, but Kakashi could hardly hear anything else over Nayamae's terrified protests.
"Please!" she cried desperately, her voice becoming more and more frantic. "Please, I'll do anything! Don't put me in there! Don't put me in there!" Kakashi couldn't tell what was happening to her with his eyes covered. He only knew he had been sat in a rather uncomfortable chair and chained to it and was left alone.
"Hey, give me a hand over here!" one of the men shouted to whomever had tied Kakashi up.
"NO!" her protests grew louder and more animalistic. "NOO!"
Kakashi couldn't take her cries much longer. He was getting angrier with every sob. He couldn't tell what they were doing to her. Chains rattled and metal doors were locked. The men laughed at her as she thrashed around, making even more noise with her cries and the sounds of the metal restraints. She yelped, sounding very much like a fox.
"Quit your whining!" one of them shouted. "Animals like you are locked up in smaller cages than that! Be glad you have room to move your head around this time." The men laughed again as they walked away. A door somewhere far off was opened and then closed.
Even after the men had left, Nayamae was still making quite the racket. She still pleaded to be let out all while struggling against the restraints. Eventually she had exhausted herself enough that Kakashi could try speaking with her.
"Naya," he started and almost immediately she stopped moving as if she just realized he was nearby. "What did they do to you?" he asked. "I can't see anything with this blindfold over my eyes."
She whimpered, gasping in short and quick breaths. "Cage," she blurted as if that was all she could say through her panic. "Small."
"Calm down," he told her softly. "Deep breaths, it's okay now. It's just the two of us."
"Can't… breathe…" she replied.
"As deep of breaths as you can make then," he continued gently. "We need to figure a way out of this."
"No way… out…" she told him. "I can… hardly move… It's getting… smaller…! I'll be crushed!" She began to cry, tugging loudly at her chains and starting up her panic again. Kakashi tried to calm her down, but it took him a while to talk her down to a calmer state so she could think clearly.
"Tell me how you're restrained," he said. "If I can get free of my own chains, I may be able to help."
Between her shallow breathing she was able to describe her predicament. They had forced her to kneel in a small cage, bent over her lap with her arms chained behind her back. The chains were attached to the wall inside a prison cell.
"Why didn't you use your sharingan?!" she asked angrily once she finished her explanation. "You would have been able to take them all out!"
"We were extremely outnumbered!" he countered. "I didn't want to accidentally hurt you in the confusion of a fight! Besides, once you heard Shinjou's voice, all you did was cower. You would have been killed before you even knew what was happening."
Nayamae growled at him. "You don't know what that woman's done to me! You don't know anything!" she spat.
"You're right, but right now, that doesn't matter and we need to work together. As far as we know, we could be dead before the night is over. The village probably won't know what's happened to us until it's too late. We need to act now." He turned his head in the direction of her voice. "Are you with me?"
She thought for a moment. "Do you trust me?" she asked softly.
He was taken aback by her sudden question. "Yes," he decided.
She nodded, smiling slightly. "Okay, so then what's your escape plan?"
Kakashi also nodded, thinking rapidly. "Alright, Naya, listen to me. Focus your kitsunebi to your hands; try to generate as much heat as possible to melt the metal enough to bend it. You can slip your hands out after that."
"What?! Are you crazy? I can't get that hot!" she half-shouted.
"Just try it!" he urged, with an annoyed huff. "We don't know how much time we have before somebody comes back! I know it's a long shot, but just try. In the meantime, I'm going to try to get out of my own chains. Work quickly!"
Kakashi had just begun to analyze where his restraints were holding him when they heard the door open and close. Light footsteps quickly approached them. Nayamae whimpered.
"Good to see they have you in our normal accommodations, Nayamae," Shinjou said, sounding please. She pulled a knife out of a sheath hanging from her thigh. "I hope you're comfortable." She smiled wickedly, opening the door to the cell. Nayamae tried to move as far away from Shinjou as possible as she moved closer to the cage. "Shh, it's alright," she assured her, lifting her chin to face her. "I'm not going to kill you now. I'm saving that pleasure for later when we have an audience." Shinjou smiled again and reached the knife between the bars of the cage, pressing it against Nayamae's cheek. Despite her fear, Nayamae growled deeply at her. In response, Shinjou swiped the knife across her cheek, leaving a deep and heavily bleeding cut. Nayamae hitched her breath in pain.
Shinjou stood, seemingly satisfied at the mark she made on Nayamae's face. "It was cruel of them to make you come after me," she said loud enough for Kakashi to hear very clearly. "They knew you weren't going to win. It's not your fault." She turned and left the cell, wiping the blood from the knife. "But that doesn't mean I won't kill you for coming back here," she added, walking towards Kakashi.
"Don't you touch him!" Nayamae shouted at her back. Blood dripped down her chin and onto the floor of the cage. She could already feel it healing, but talking opened the wound more. "Don't you dare touch him!"
She stopped at turned back to her. "Don't touch him?" she questioned slyly.
"You hurt him, I will make sure you don't live to see the next day," Nayamae threatened.
Shinjou laughed heartily. "You are in no position to be making threats to me, fox," she said, standing behind Kakashi and pressing the knife against his throat. He hitched his breath, startled at her sudden threat. She got down closer to his face, still staring at Nayamae with a menacing smile and keeping the knife on his neck. "Is he your lover? Is that why you don't want me to touch him?" Nayamae's eyes flickered red, yet Shinjou saw it. "Oh? Does the real fox want to come out and play?" she teased with a laugh. She released him and put the knife back into its sheath. "It'll have to wait."
She unlocked his chains and forced him to stand. "We'll talk elsewhere," she said to him, leading him out of the stone cellar and up the stairs. Nayamae shouted obscenities at Shinjou as they left, her shouts being muffled behind the closed door.
"Much quieter," Shinjou commented casually.
She continued to lead Kakashi away from the cellar, and further into her home, eventually sitting him down on a soft cushion at a low table. He was surprised when his blindfold was removed, only to be retied over his left eye. His hands remained tied behind his back. The sliding paper doors were closed, but he could see outlined shadows from two men who guarded the door from outside. He guessed it was either late night or early morning. On the table a bowl of fruit sat between him and Shinjou. Two glasses and a small jug were in front of her.
"I don't want to risk being put under a genjutsu," Shinjou told him as she poured them shots of sake. "I hope you don't mind the precaution. Sake?" she offered. He stared at her silently. She nodded, taking a sip from her own cup. "That's right, you shinobi try to abstain from alcohol. My apologies."
"Why did you bring me in here?" he asked impatiently. "Are you wanting to negotiate something?"
She poured herself another drink. "Something like that," she replied. "It has nothing to do with the fox. She's been a nuisance ever since she showed up here." She shook her head. "No, I need something different from you." She downed another shot of sake before continuing. "I don't have any issues with your village, but it's only been recently that I've seen an increased amount of your shinobi in my territory. And then you show up. I don't like it. Any particular reason I'm being targeted?" She looked at him expectantly.
Kakashi continued to stare at her silently, wondering if he should bother answering any of her questions at all. He didn't particularly appreciate her putting a knife to his throat, nor did he like how she treated Nayamae.
When he didn't reply, Shinjou set down her drink. "I have no quarrel with the Hidden Leaf, so why are you here? Your Hokage wouldn't send one of his strongest shinobi to my home for no reason."
"We were here to survey the land and nothing more," Kakashi said, finally breaking his silence.
Shinjou didn't seem satisfied with that answer. He noted she was fingering the hilt of the knife on her thigh, but moved her hand back besides her glass on the table.
"Nothing more," she echoed thoughtfully. "Personally, Kakashi, I don't believe you. But since I have no intentions of making a complete enemy of your village, I won't order my men to torture the information out of you. I'm not stupid." She stood, turning away from him to put the sake away in a small cupboard against the wall. "I run a business, Kakashi. I sell my products where there is demand. Your village has begun to demand a bigger supply from me."
"You're destroying our people and their livelihoods," he countered. "Your 'products' are killing people, Shinjou."
"I run a business," she repeated matter-of-factly. She still had her back to him, staring at a picture frame that sat on top of the cupboard. "What those people do with what they buy isn't my concern, as long as they continue to pay me the money."
Kakashi narrowed his eye, focusing on the photo in the frame. He could barely make out a head with short black hair. "Nayamae didn't kill Ryu," he said bluntly, assuming that's who was in the photograph she was staring at.
Shinjou froze, turning slowly back to him. Her eyes were flaring with anger. "What… did you say...?"
"Nayamae didn't kill Ryu," he repeated, a little louder. "Orochimaru killed your son."
Quicker than Kakashi had seen her move, she had flipped the table in front of him with a loud yell and held the tip of the knife under his chin. Hearing the noise from outside, several guards had opened the sliding doors to the room, their swords drawn.
"Choose your next words carefully," she gritted, seemingly unaware of the guards that had entered the room. "How would you know anything about my son?"
"I saw it in Nayamae's memories myself. Your anger should be towards Orochimaru, not the girl," Kakashi said calmly, glaring up at her with his one eye.
She met his glare with her own. Slowly, she lowered the knife from his throat. "Maybe so," she said, "but it'll be me that will kill the both of you myself." She grabbed him by his arm, yanking him up from the cushion. The guards parted as she exited, dragging Kakashi behind her from the room. He nearly cried out in pain. She dragged him by his upper arm, his hands still tied together. He felt like his shoulder was becoming dislocated. She was much stronger than she looked.
Suddenly, she stopped walking, squeezing tighter onto his arm, her nails digging into his skin. "NO!" she yelled furiously. Kakashi glanced at what she was looking at. The door to the stone cellar was wide open, something he was sure she had shut when they had left an hour before. The metal lock had been melted off of the door.
"FIND HER!" Shinjou screamed to the men that had followed them. "FIND HER AND BRING HER TO ME!" Immediately, they all ran off, searching the grounds. She glared down at Kakashi. "I don't care if it brings war with your village," she told him harshly, "but I am killing you both and dumping your bodies at the Hokage's feet."
Things are only going to get more intense from here. What do you think will happen next?
Thanks for reading!