Ch. 15: Accuracy
Kaida jumped over the railing and landed lightly on the ground below, almost squatting with her hands on the ground on either side of her legs, which were balanced on the balls of her feet. She stood up as Chinatsu dropped to the ground on the opposite side of the arena. The proctor started the match, saying, "Sou Kaida versus Hyūga Chinatsu." He backed up so he wasn't between the two opponents, all the while holding a senbon needle between his teeth. "Let the match begin!"
Neither of the girls moved a muscle, other than the ones in their eyes, studying the other. I, for one, knew that this was Kaida's way of having fun in our village, where she knew she would easily beat her opponent. She would study their body structure, the build of the muscles and such, and from that, would try to guess their fighting style. She'd play with them for a bit in the way that a cat would play with a mouse before eating it, just long enough to see all of their tricks, then she would end the match and evaluate her conjecture. She would usually test her newest skills on them, 'living training dummies,' as she called them.
The whole arena and all of its occupants, mainly consisting of the genin teams and their senseis, all on the second, balcony-like viewing floor, was silent. Hyūga Chinatsu broke the silence. "I see that you are a Sou. One of your kind was executed here about a week ago. It was great fun to watch the insect die."
"Chinatsu!" One of the genins on the other side of the arena spoke, half in disbelief, half reproachfully. I took her to be Chinatsu's teammate.
"I wonder if you'll squirm as delightfully as the other one did when on the brink of death," Chinatsu said, unperturbed.
"Oh yeah, and you're not allowed to kill here," Yumi whispered into my ear.
"Ah, that's why the 'brink' was in there."
"That's what I'm guessing."
I shoved my hand into my weapons pouch and felt around for the slim disk. I found it, then the action started.
Kaida was the one who made the first move. She took out a small scroll, whipped it open as fast as a whip cracks, inserted a small flow of chakra, and released a samurai sword with a wickedly curved blade, and in the same fluid motion, launched the weapon at Chinatsu, the whole process happening in the blink of an eye. Chinatsu, in turn, activated her Byakugan and knocked the blade off course with a hit to its handle. The blade flew towards and imbedded itself deeply in the wall. I didn't recognize the sword, so I guessed she got it from her friend, the weapons-mistress, Ten-Ten. Kaida swore in frustration. Chinatsu turned on her.
"How dare you use such vulgar language around me, you bitch!"
"Hey, you're not so pleasant yourself, although I wouldn't call you a bitch. You're not feminine enough. You'd be more like a… warthog, maybe," Kaida answered, calm as ever.
While they continued to trade insults, Yumi told Deki and I about the specifics of this stage.
"This is the elimination round. After that, the people who are left draw a number, which is the number of the battle you are in. Oh, and I think Kaida's going to try out her newest weapon. I think it will be very effective against Chinatsu," she predicted.
I looked to the center, and sure enough, while the insults went flying back and forth, Kaida's hand was slowly creeping towards her weapon pouch. I saw a glint of light shine off of a length of ninja wire and a sharp metal point.
It happened quickly. Kaida launched about five shuriken towards Chinatsu, two of which had ninja wire attached to the inner ring section of each point. Chinatsu, with her Byakugan still activated, easily swatted away the first three. She went for the fourth and fifth, but to her surprise, they split into four sections, so there now were eight interlocking projectiles with four out of five sharp sides each, and all were connected to Kaida's fingers with chakra-proof ninja wires.
They flew around Chinatsu, wrapping around and around her, binding her tightly. Chinatsu managed to grab onto a handful of the wires and sent a powerful wave of chakra through them. Kaida disconnected all but two of the wires. Consequently, the chakra went through her body and made her system go haywire. Now free, Chinatsu walked up to Kaida. It seemed like the end of the match was here, and Chinatsu had gained the upper hand. Kaida sank to her knees, struggling to keep control over her spasming body, then—
Within a split second, Kaida whipped out her katana and ran it through Chinatsu's stomach and out the back, just as Chinatsu jabbed Kaida's last chakra point, paralyzing her.
Kaida stayed there, stuck on her knees with her hand clenched around the blade, and Chinatsu bent forward, coughing up blood, still impaled on the stationary katana. The proctor ended the match. A tie.
The med-nins came bustling out and carefully pulled Chinatsu off of the skewering katana and placed her on a stretcher and carried her away, while some others removed the sword from Kaida's hand and carried both it and her to the infirmary.
I myself froze stiff as soon as I realized something. I rushed over to Yumi.
"What if Deki and Washi face each other? Deki still is furious, and thinks that you and Washi you know…"
"Shit," she swore. She started to talk, but was interrupted by the spinning panels choosing the duelers for the next match. It landed on…
Riku Tomoko vs. Roshimi Riki.
"Well, we get a little more time," I commented. On the other side of the arena, a scrawny kid toppled ungracefully to the ground and landed on his face. He immediately got up and started brushing off his dark beige sweater, muttering curses while at it. I took my hand out of the pouch, then hopped onto the railing, about to descend much more delicately then this Riki character.
"Hey!" Surprised, I unbalanced and fell off. My foot caught onto the railing and turned me upside down, and I continued hurtling towards the ground. I turned the fall to a somersault in midair, then I landed lightly, right hand and left leg on the ground on either side of my bent left leg, and my right leg stretched out behind, my knee almost touching the ground. I stood up, looking up at the newcomer and grinning widely despite my annoyance. Then, I stepped to the middle, observing my opponent. The headband around his neck showed that he was a shinobi from the Land of Snow. I heard it was freezing there, all the time, which was exactly why I couldn't understand that this shrimpy guy was wearing a sweater in the warmth of Konoha.
The proctor called the start, and my opponent moved immediately, showering me with a barrage of kicks and punches. The attacks themselves were pretty weak, and the hardest might have left a small bruise, but the skinny guy was fast. He was pretty much a blur unless I reached in my weapons pouch and touched the Sharingan Disk. Then, it was simple to track his movements. I stood there, taking the hits, waiting for him to get tired so I could actually land a hit on him. After all—the Sharingan Disk only affected my eyesight, not my physical speed. The only other problem—about five minutes passed and the flurry of hits wasn't letting up at all. I finally got fed up.
"Too scared to stand and fight?"
"Too heavy to move?" he answered.
"Hey, watch it! I'll have you know that I'm pretty quick on my feet, but I'm not a buzzing, annoying pest like you!"
"Let me tell the story of your life. One day, you wanted to become a ninja. So you did. But then you met a guy named Riki." His voice came from all over, and his soft attacks were starting to hurt from hitting my skin in the same places over and over again. "They had a battle."
"Then Tomoko, the shinobi, defeated Riki, who became a depressed old geezer," I filled in.
"Oh my god, who's telling the story? I am! Now shut up!"
"Why don't you?"
"Oh, my, god! Do you know what shut up means?"
I finally had enough. This guy just kept pushing my buttons. And not just the mental ones. I swiftly grabbed a handful of seeds from the outmost pocket of the pouch on my right thigh, threw them on the ground by my feet, rapidly made the necessary handsigns, then pushed my chakra into the seeds, my own breed of roses with vines, willing them to grow up and up, higher and higher. I slowly rose up off the ground, lifted by three large, glossy, dark green leaves, which quickly grew a spiny, hair-like coat all over themselves, except not in the places I touched.
But, with a foot on one leaf and the other between the other two, my balance was compromised. I tipped forward and had to use a thick stem as a spotter to regain my balance. The thorns retracted as soon as I came within a millimeter of them. Good thing too—these thorns and the spines all over the three main roses carried a toxin that paralyzed a person. The attacks stopped once I got about ten feet off of the ground, and the blur condensed into one short, skinny guy in a beige sweater.
"Roses? How much more girly can you get?" he exclaimed.
"Watch it," I answered with an ominous tone before pulsing the spines to extend a foot more in the area he was standing closest to. He barely dodged them.
"Wow, someone's got a temper!"
"Bad move." I kept an eye on his position and began to prepare my genjutsu. I hopped down twelve feet and landed lightly on the ground. I slowly walked towards him, only for 'Riki' to disappear in a 'poof' and the attacks to restart. "Frick!" I muttered under my breath. I jumped back up to my three-leaf platform, level with the second viewing floor.
I sat down on the leaves, criss-cross-applesauce, and concentrated. I shut my eyes, and turned off all of my senses except for my sense of touch. I transferred most of my chakra network to the plant, so instead of an arm waving, a spiny vine would shake instead. I focused and felt wind blowing strongly and moving the thin 'hairs' on the surface of the vines, behind the spiky thorns. I followed the wind's trail around and around. Then, in one fluid movement, I retracted every last spine from one of the vines, then captured my opponent, wrapping him up tightly.
Parting with the plant and merging my chakra back with my body, I kept the plant's tight grip until I was down in front of him. I lowered him so his feet touched the ground. He attempted to slip out of the sweater to escape the rope-like wrappings, but only succeeded in showing off his red shirt and baring his arms. I understood the reason for the sweater. They were stick-like arms, arms covered in white scars. And not just thin, small, paper-cut-like scars. Thick, long jagged scars, running all the way down, spiraling around, zigzagging back and forth, ripping through his darkly tanned skin.
He looked me straight in the eye, and said quietly but fiercely, "You'll never understand what it's like to be me."
"Then hopefully, this will be a sweet, dreamless rest," I whispered for he and he only to hear. I activated my genjutsu and prepared the substance to start the genjutsu, intending to make him fall under the genjutsu's power, but leave out the torture part.
Suddenly, I felt a surge of power welling up from my eyes, then spreading all throughout my body. "On second thought, I'll prolong your agony for as long as possible. Your scream for mercy will be music to my ears," I heard myself say, cold and evilly. I walked toward him and he began to shrink back with a look of fear in his eyes. Annoyed by his bonds, I turned the roses to ash with a snap of my fingers, approaching him with each step.
I held my right hand out to my side. A long black apparition appeared and hardened into an obsidian spear. I could feel the ice-cold aura emanating from it. The power felt good. I threw the spear at him, and it passed cleanly through his belly and out the other side. He threw up blood, his body wracked with coughs that brought up mouthfuls of dark red liquid. He raised his hand in surrender as he started to sway on his feet.
"The match is over. Riku Tomoko is the victor," the proctor said. I instantaneously saw the spear fade away, and the cold, raw power was sucked back into my eyes. I suddenly felt exhausted. I started swaying, even though I willed myself to stand up straight. I waved off the med-nins ready to take me to the infirmary should I need to go, and two of my friends jumped down to aid me in getting back up to the railing. I slid down the wall to sit on the floor, leaning against the wall with Yumi sitting on my left. The second of the two helpful friends sat down on my other side, to my right.
"I scared you earlier, huh?" he teased. I leaned my head on Yumi's shoulder.
"Shush up," I mumbled, ready to fall asleep but attempting to fight it. "Glad to see you're okay, Kazu."
The darkness pulling my heavy eyelids shut prevailed, and I fell asleep quickly.