Each one prays to God according to his own light.
~Mohandas Gandhi
Natsuki splashed the water in his face. "Don't drink that you idiot!"
Kenpatchi blinked rapidly and wiped off his face. "What the hell was that for?"
"That's river water."
"So?"
"You don't get out of the village much, do you?" Natsuki continued with out waiting for an answer. "The water in the villages are purified to be cleaner to a point that your body can't drink natural water from the wild."
"Like river water?"
She nodded.
"Why not?"
"Because it'll make you sick. If you drink it, you'll puke it right back up."
"She's right." Sora commented, thinking back and making a sickened face. "I learned that the hard way."
Kenpatchi held up his canteen. "I guess I should get rid of this then. I just refilled it."
He sighed as he dumped the water into the river. He had only been traveling with them for a few days now, and Natsuki took charge of him. She would point out something he was doing wrong and every once in a while Sora would pop in to their argument and agree with her.
It made sense. Natsuki was intelligent and knew what she was doing and Sora knew from experience. He was lucky to have gone on a B-rank mission before and barely knew anything about life on the road.
He thought camping would be fun, but the other two both seemed like they would do anything to sleep inside in a bed at night. He thought money wouldn't be an issue because they would steal, but it was the other way around. They stole when they knew money was an issue. He had made the mistake of bringing up how exciting it would be to travel the world. They corrected him instantly on that one.
They weren't traveling. They were running. In fact, they would be grateful to be able to stay in one place for a long while. If you traveled, it wasn't for enjoyment but more for a mission.
Like right now. Headed to a village filled with felons and criminals and- according to his female friend- people who hired felons and criminals to do dirty work. It was a mission to make money.
"I've heard this is the last road to the city." Natsuki said after walking a little bit and reaching an odd road that led into swampy area.
"What's so bad about it?" Kenpatchi asked. "Besides, you'll get gunk all over your shoes and shit."
"I've seen very few people come out of that path, Kenpatchi. Going down that path is like going through hell."
"It's not that bad." Sora remembered back. "Well...it wasn't when I went here with my Senpai."
"Senpai?"
"You finally got rid of him and grew up?" Natsuki remembered Brom from her first meeting with Sora.
Sora didn't say anything, but shivered a little.
"I dun get it." Kenpatchi mumbled.
Natsuki hissed back, "He died you idoit! Don't talk about it?"
His eyes widened and he whispered, "How do you know if you just asked?"
"Didn't you see how he reacted? He's still recovering from losing him."
"There's a sign." Sora said suddenly.
"Sign? Kenpatchi repeated.
"You have to show some sort of sign to show you're a friend of the village." He brought his hand to his head, frustrated. "If only I can remember what."
Natsuki sat down on a rock and thought with him.
Kenpatchi sat in the grass across from her. He couldn't possibly think of a sign. Too hard. He found himself staring at the missing-nin.
He knew she was pretty. Prettiest who had talked to him he thought. She didn't try to show off her chest like most girls he knew and maybe had even attempted to hide it in her baggy brown clothes. He didn't care. Girls who showed them off were sluts. Her hair was maybe the prettiest part about her. It was so long and a pretty pale blonde color. Made her deep blue eyes stand out more-
"Got it."
Her words made him flinch and turn pick. He was staring at her. Had she noticed?
"If the people had to give some sort of symbol, we have to look for similarities."
"Similarities?" Sora repeated softly.
"I doubt the symbol is something like a handsign that's only done once."
"I don't think it was." Sora agreed.
"Right. It's too hard to spot. So we're looking for marking of some kind. A marking that at least most of the people going on that path have."
"Like a mark on the face?" Kenpatchi thought of the facepaint that some shinobi choose to wear.
"No..no..too obvious." Natsuki rested her head on her hand and continued to think. "Something like clothing would be a good start. They all wear blue, or have a scarf? Something like that."
"...possible. But Sempai never gave me anything when we went here. And I never wore anything special last time I came here ether."
"What'd you wear?"
"More or less the same I have now." Sora said. His outfit really hadn't changed much over the years.
"Guessing at this point is too hard." Natsuki sighed. "We'll get no where. Besides, we still have to see what other people have with them."
"So we're stuck here?" Sora released suddenly. "We came all this way to sit and watch!"
Natsuki shrugged. "That or commit suicide by running into that place."
Sora realized her point. He sighed and sat down.
Kenpatchi looked over at him. He knew he would get bored eventually...
"Wanna train?"
Thought she would never admit it, Natsuki was jealous. She was a puppet master and never fought physically.
She hardly ever trained her body. She was too skinny, so skinny it was almost unhealthy. Her arms were like twigs and couldn't pull herself up with just them. She wasn't fast, but average in speed and lost her breath easily. She could throw small weapons such as kunai easily and accurately. Her chakra control was master's level and she skillfully mastered controlling her self-made puppets. In school, she could be top of the class in anything that involved thinking.
But Taijustu was something she could never master. And both boys with her clearly had it down.
They were attacking each other at extreme speeds, movements a blur. Each kick, each block, each punch, was pure instinct like both had done it before a million times.
When they realized how they weren't improving, Kenpatchi wiped out his weapon and threw a Wind Release jutsu at him. Sora saw through it and flipped back to avoid it. Midair, he reached up his sleeve and pulled out hidden shurikin. He threw them in the shinobi's direction. Kenpatchi reacted with another Wind Release, flinging the weapons in another direction-
Toward Natsuki.
She ducked in time, them narrowly missing the top of her head and one deflecting off her forehead protector.
"...you guys should stop. You've trained enough."
"Yeah." Sora agreed, sitting down. He looked tired.
"Kay." Kenpatchi agreed, "Just don't puke up or anything Sora."
Natsuki looked at him oddly. "Why would he vomit?"
Kenpatchi blinked. "You seriously don't know?"
"No."
The older boy grinned widely, feeling smarter for once. "Stress on the body. Overworking yourself will make you feel dizzy, give you a headache or upset stomach. It's a good thing, cause it means your building muscle and all. You'll just have to take a break to puke it up."
"I guess it makes sense..." Natsuki mumbled. "Stress does do that. I didn't think it was that extreme though."
Something rubbed against Kenpatchi's leg. He looked down and saw his Komodo dragon at his side. The dragon stop it's tongue out a number of times.
Kenpatchi looked back up at the other two. "Someone's coming."
There were two someones. A strong looking man with a scar running down his neck and an older woman with a walking staff. The man held a lantern in his left hand.
The three watched from a high area, safely away from the travelers.
The man held the lantern out in front of him. He lit a match and lit the lantern up. Red light came from it, colored by the glass surrounding the flame.
Sora's eyes grew larger as he stared at the light.
His sempai carrying him on his back, giving him one last warning to keep his eyes peeled holding his red lantern ahead of them to light the way.
The shinobi in the village giving him a red lantern to light is way, because 'it's getting dark and you need something to see in that forest.'
The signal...
"It's the red lantern."
"You remember now?"
Sora nodded. "I was never told it was the signal, but I was given a red lantern when I traveled on my own. And when with Brom-sempai. He carried a red lantern. Just like that."
"But you were never told it was the signal."
"Never."
Natsuki thought for a second. Then she summoned up the lantern they had with them from her scroll.
"That's no good." Sora said, seeing its clear glass. "It has to be red."
"It appears you're right, bonehead." Natsuki said, putting it back into the scroll.
"So what'do we do, Suki-chan?" Kenpatchi asked. "Get a new one?"
"There's not a glass workshop or store that sells it in miles." Natsuki groaned.
She tightened the strap carrying the massive scroll and stood up. "Get moving. We're following them."
They followed the adults from a safe distance where the light was still clearly visible. About an hour into it, Kenpatchi picked up something. "Guys?
"What do you think it is?" He held up a small, dirty object that fit easily in his hand. It was shaped somewhat like a solid circle with twig like material coming out of it and forming a triangle. There was dry blood on it.
Natsuki took it and examined it. "It's a vertebrae."
"A what?"
"I think that's a bone in your spine." Sora replied.
"That's right." Natsuki agreed. She studied it. 3 holes instead of one and smaller in size. "From the cervical region- near the neck."
"Where'd it come from?" Sora asked.
The answer came from a sharp snap of a twig. Kenpatchi's dragon snapped another one to get their attention. He was standing over a human head.
It wasn't much of a head anymore. The eyes were gone from their sockets. The skin was rotting away and the hair was almost all gone. Insects were buzzing around it, landing on it and feasting. The upper neck was open, and looked like it had been ripped there.
"Eww!" Kenpatchi yelled out. Sora cringed a little and Natsuki looked a little creeped out herself.
The blonde went up and examined it for a second. "It looks like it was ripped off in a rush. Not intensional. Doesn't matter. Lets keep moving."
Sora raced ahead, followed by the guy and the girl behind him. He blinked. "Where's the light?"
The glowing red light ahead of him was fading. He panicked and sped up. He could hear Kenpatchi yell something from behind him, but didn't listen. He ran, leaping from branch to branch. He felt something wet on his head. Rain. He wiped it off and kept running. The light grew dimmer.
He didn't stop. He keep running and running, not looking where he was going. He didn't notice until he was up in the air that there wasn't a branch ahead of him.
Sora screamed and feel down. What he expected to be the ground below him, wasn't hard. It was wet. Mud hit his face and he remembered this was a swamp. Splashing, he pulling himself up out of the filthy water. It was swallow and came up to his waist. Muck covered him from head to toe. He coughed, spitting liquid out of his mouth.
The red light was gone.