The smoking bowl of tobacco felt hot and refreshing in Kumo's pale frigid hand. The white flakes of snow fell from the heavens and occasionally landed in the bowl disappearing in the glow of the orange embers forever lost but not before crying out with a protesting hiss. He let the smoke slip out through his lips and watched it swirl in front of him intermixing with the drifting snowflakes. He wiped a few flakes off the tinted lenses of his brass goggles and leather skullcap that held his village headband. He reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and produced a photograph of a pretty blond haired green eyed girl smiling at up him.
"That your girlfriend?" A man asked him sitting across from him hands bound in front of him. A tall cat faced ANBU stood behind him keeping a keen eye on the prisoner. The masked shinobi gave the prisoner a right hook to the head knocking him off his seat and into the snow.
"I thought I told you to keep quiet." He said to the prisoner pulling him out of the snow and backs onto his seat half his body white from gathered snow.
"And I thought I told you not to get too rough with the prisoners." Said Kumo tapping a few ashes out of his pipe the snow sizzled as a few embers touched the white blanket almost as if the snow was whispering to him its protests to the red embers.
The ANBU didn't respond to his protest but Kumo was sure he had noted his order to be a little more gentile with the prisoner. Although he supposed that little bit of unnecessary roughness could be useful in a longer run. The prisoner was more likely to open up to him if he felt like he had a friend in his interrogator. They had spent the last month tracking a newly formed syndicate of rouge shinobi though the borders. So far the chase had yielded little more than this single prisoner that had been captured by an ANBU recon force. They had been moving across the nation's borders staying small and fast only visiting villages to gather intelligence of when the enemy passed through the area. From what they were managing to find out they almost managed to put the mysterious group in a corner. They were a couple days away from the border to the Land of Iron; they had given word to the nation's military to put their borders on guard and reinforcements from the leaf were also on their way. With some luck and precision this painful ordeal would be over soon. Until then Kumo was to interrogate the prisoner on the move and get as much information as possible before the coming fight and more importantly find out if this group was working alone in their terrorist activities or if they were a branch to a larger terrorist cell. Usually Kumo wouldn't try to interrogate anyone while on the move but the circumstances didn't leave him much choice in the matter.
"So you didn't answer me." Said the prisoner shaking his head and trying to free the snow that had clung to his head. "That blond your girlfriend?"
Kumo tucked the photo back into his breast pocket taking a moment to feel for the small item that almost seemed to be burning inside his pocket ever since he had procured it four villages ago. As far as he was concerned this mission couldn't end fast enough for him. He couldn't think of a time he wanted go home more than he did now. He had found himself counting the days he had been away from Ino. He wondered at what number he had stopped counting for his comrade Nenshō. He supposed he stopped counting days after a year had passed. So he hadn't counted for around a year and three months. It seemed after a year of counting days it seemed pointless to him. Nenshō wasn't coming back. After killing Hiashi Hyūga there was no way he could return to Konoha or Tenten. Telling himself that didn't make him feel any better.
The prisoner rubbed his hands together and shivered from the cold blowing into his hands trying to warm them. "Cold?" asked Kumo letting the remains of his pipe fall out onto the snow.
"Yeah." He said shrugging off the snow that had collected on his shoulders and jacket. "Have a blanket you can spare?"
"I think we can find something to keep you warmer." Said Kumo standing up to go fetch a blanket for him hoping the kind gesture would get the man talking. The more he talked the sooner this mission could end and he could go home. And right now he wanted nothing more than to go home.
Kumo and the ANBU moved through the forest swiftly and silently keeping to the tree's as they closed in. Kumo took up the rear watching all angles with his Byakugan keeping a watch. His seven man squad was only short one member who was keeping an eye on the prisoner Itami, was his name and if his Intel was correct his group was close almost at the border to the Land of Iron days only a quarter day's travel from here. The ANBU that stayed behind was to direct the reinforcements that were on their way and would join them soon when they got into position. As soon as the reinforcements arrived they would close in and drive them into the border where the Land of Iron's samurai waited for them sending the rouge shinobi between them.
Kumo smirked to himself; it might be awhile before he was deployed on another mission. After a month away from his home and from Ino he wasn't eager to leave again anytime soon. He had never thought he'd have so much work in his life to need any time off. As much as he had been working lately he was sure Tsunade would give him a couple weeks off or at the very least keep him in the village.
A figure moved in the distance barely within the ranges of his Byakugan he signaled the squad to slow up and move to the ground to not be seen. Kumo pulled the tanto strapped to his back and held it at the ready as he moved through the snow with the squad ready to take defensive scouting positions to keep them in locked in and in sight.
A whisper sounded through the air and one of the ANBU members in front of him fell to the white earth. A cut was open in his neck seeping blood through it but no kunai or arrow showed to him. A faint click and another man went down no sign of blade and missile. Another member drew his ninjatō and took a defensive stance his sword moving before being opened. Kumo retraced his Byakugan and suddenly everything came into view. Thick wooden crossbow bolts stuck out of the throats of two of the ANBU the shaft and fletching's were covered in strange archaic writings a sealing Jutsu that somehow was keeping him from seeing it with his Byakugan. He looked up and saw five men in the tree's crossbows in hand their bodies covered from head to foot in the runes of the sealing Jutsu. Kumo reached into the puppet strapped to his back pulling a scroll from within a door when a blast caught him and took him off his feet putting him face first in the snow his ears ringing. He stood up putting his tanto at the ready catching sight of a bolt and deflecting it. He ran through the wood retreating trying to keep a keen eye out for the crossbow bolts and deflecting any that came too close. He felt almost blind without his Byakugan but every threat would be truly invisible to him. Another tree burst into a shower of splinters and knocked Kumo into another tree. He heard a couple of his ribs snap and cried out in pain. One of the sealed shinobi charged him kunai in hand. Kumo caught the blade with his tanto and extended a line of chakra strings to the scorpion puppet on his back and brought it to life animating the tail and bringing it around stabbing it into the ninja's side. Kumo threw the ninja off of him and moved trying to ignore the pain at his side. A bolt caught him in his calf flying in from his blindside tearing straight through the muscle and sending him back down in the snow and dirt. He dropped his knife and pulled the small hand crossbow at his hip he took aim at another advancing enemy and fired. The man deflected the bolt easily. Kumo pulled the string back and loaded in another bolt firing it again fruitlessly. The bolt was deflected again and the man stepped closer.
"Is that toy really supposed to kill me?" he asked pressing the tip of the kunai between Kumo's eyes. He didn't say anything as he raised his free hand in the air steel razor wire extended from spools attached to the knuckles of his gloves. Snow was thrown up and small lines formed in the white earth as more invisible threads shot up from the ground and wrapped around the man cutting into his flesh and bone staining the snow crimson.
Kumo screamed as another crossbow bolt bit into him. It got him in the back shooting into his shoulder blade. It shattered the bone but managed to halt the bolt from passing through him.
Kumo slumped forward face first into the snow weak and dazed barely clinging to conciseness. He listened to the sound of snow crunching under boots. He cried out for his body to move to extend his chakra string and bring his puppets to life and fight for him but his body wouldn't move it was all he could do to keep from blacking out.
A hand roughly gripped his shoulder and pulled him up. He looked at the cat faced ANBU that had been left to watch the prisoner and direct the reinforcements. At his side stood the prisoner Itami he stepped forward and kneeled down looking into Kumo's eyes.
"You're pretty tough to take down." He said, "But not half as tough without your Byakugan to see everything for you. And without being able to use it you probably felt blind fighting this battle."
Kumo felt his eyes begin to slump as drowsiness and felt himself slipping away. "Keep him concuss." Said Itami, the turn cloak ANBU squeezed his shoulder shaking him bringing Kumo back from the brink of sleep quite painfully.
"Just stay awake long enough to answer this question and save me the trouble of hauling your body for miles with you bleeding all over me and my men. Not to mention you can spare yourself the trouble of being in my company. You can even go home to that blond… if someone finds you in time. But I'm just rambling now. So tell me… where is Nenshō Kinzoku?"