Another encounter with an actual Ōkami-Kage. Except, something is a little off...
A few days after the incident in the jagged lands, Michiru received a phone call. "Hello? Oh, yes! …Right… Of course… Yes, we'll be there… Oh? All right, I'll let him know. Thank you."
"Who was that?" Shota asked after she hung up. "Didn't sound like the conversations you have with Tsume."
"It was the Commission, actually."
He looked surprised. "I almost forgot that you guys work directly with those guys."
"Unfortunately."
"Are they bothersome?"
"That's one way to put it." She joined him at the table. "Anyways, since Tsume is off dealing with Ōkami-Kage related matters elsewhere, they need Jaz and me to deal with something closer by."
"Why you guys? You've only got provisional licenses…"
She shrugged. "They expect the Ōkami-Kage to be involved. Almost no one in the public knows much of anything about them, as well as very select few heroes. It's all kept under wraps to avoid fear and hysteria, I suppose. Since the Tora are the sister clan of the Ōkami-Kage and know so much about them, we're the ones called to deal with anything potentially related. Most other heroes aren't allowed to look into it."
"Interesting." He took a long sip from a juice box he had in his hand.
"Even more interesting is that you apparently have permission to tag along."
He paused, straw still in his mouth, and stared blankly at her. "…Huh? Why?"
"Tsume had to report your encounter with Sasori-Kage. Of course, he also had to tell them about yours and Hizashi's knowledge of the Ōkami-Kage as a result. I don't think he got in too much trouble over it, though."
"I have to work directly under those guys now, too?" He furrowed his brow.
Michiru chuckled. "No. The reason they said it was okay is because Tsume requested it, apparently."
"Tsume wants me to go on this mission with you?"
She nodded. "Guess so. Of course, you don't have to."
"It's difficult to say no to him…"
"Really? You think so? I find it rather easy. Maybe you're secretly too nice," she teased lightly. When he did not respond and went back to loudly sipping his drink, she smiled and stood up. "We're leaving around four."
"Got it."
Later, the two of them left the house, Michiru kissing Pan on the nose as she instructed him to guard the house. As they followed the path from the house that led to the main road, she transformed into the large white tiger and crouched. "Climb on."
He looked at her curiously.
"It's faster this way."
"All right then." He moved closer, threw his leg over her back, and sat himself behind her shoulders.
"Hold on," she told him as she stood up.
He jerked backwards as she suddenly bolted forward and quickly caught himself by grabbing hold of her thick fur with both hands. She laughed, amused that he had been caught off-guard despite her warning. The last time they had done this, it had been during that training exercise at school where they had to escape Kubo and Ueno. However, now, there was no pursuer and no reason not to enjoy the ride. And he certainly did find it enjoyable. Riding a giant tiger through the town, passing people who either yelped in surprise or laughed and called a happy greeting to Michiru… Of course the townspeople knew her. This was probably a common occurrence, seeing a massive white and lavender-striped tiger dashing through the town.
It took perhaps forty minutes or so to reach their destination this way. It did appear to have been faster, though, as Michiru passed up many vehicles and busses along the way. When she slowed to a stop, Shota found that her breathing was calm and she was not exhausted in the slightest.
"What's with that stamina?" he muttered.
"Jealous?" She smirked. She remained in her beast form and sat down to wait.
A yellow tiger with jagged purple stripes appeared soon after and joined them.
"Hello, Jaz," Michiru greeted him warmly. "Or should I say, Raiko?"
He looked embarrassed. "That name Tsume gave me…"
"You don't like it?"
"It's not that, it's just… It sounds too cool for me."
She smiled kindly at him before standing and leading the way. They were heading out of the city. "There should be a seemingly abandoned shack in the woods around here," she said as they walked. "Reports state that several suspicious people have gone in but never out. One of their descriptions matches the known human form of an Ōkami-Kage known as Doku-Kage."
"Doku-Kage?" Shota echoed.
She nodded. "We have very few records of any of the current Ōkami-Kage clan members. The records we do have are mainly on the oldest members who have been alive for over hundreds of years."
"Are you serious?"
"Yeah. I told you that the SuperBeast Clans live a long time."
"But hundreds of years? Seriously? Are you guys really going to live that long?"
"I'd be okay with just not dying today…" Jaz grunted.
"The original clan members live far longer than the youngest members," Michiru explained to Shota. "That goes for their spouses and people that remain close to them all the time as well. It's not impossible, I suppose, but I doubt that Jaz or I will live past a hundred and ten."
"That's still a really long time," he told her. "And how exactly does it affect the people around them?"
"Did Tsume or I not tell you this stuff yet? Well, it's all related to the mysterious Seishin. The Seishin are constantly exerting a powerful force of energy that feeds into living things around them. The Seishin actually created the Tora and Ōkami-Kage, in a way."
"How so?"
"According to our ancient tomes, which I can show you back home if you want, the Seishin gave select humans special powers. The first was given the ability to turn into a giant tiger and to read and alter the auras of living things. The second was given the ability to turn into a giant wolf and to enforce either rage or peace upon living things. The others were the younger siblings of those two. Being given the powers of the Seishin themselves, the Tora and Ōkami-Kage naturally exert a similar force. This force affects those around us in subtle ways, but the most obvious one is how things and people live longer when they live with us and are consistently around us. You're being affected by it, too!"
"You're somehow extending my life expectancy?" He cocked an eyebrow at her.
"Not intentionally, but yes. I'm not sorry."
"Um, okay? Anyways, back to the task at hand… Doku-Kage is one of these original members?"
"Yeah, supposedly. I mean, he's in some of the ancient books, but this is the first we've heard of anyone spotting him in current times. Either way, we should be cautious. Doku-Kage has a Quirk that allows him to exhale a poisonous fog. It isn't fatal, but it causes headaches, dizziness, fatigue, trouble breathing, and even hallucinations. Not to mention how it obstructs your sight."
"Doesn't sound like a good job for me. Why did Tsume want me to come along?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "But I have faith in you, and I'm sure he does too. Ah, wait."
They stopped and looked, spotting a tiny wooden shack nestled between the trees. It was old, dilapidated, and smelled of rotten wood and mold. It was no wonder people believed it to be abandoned.
"Sense anyone?" Jaz asked Michiru.
"No," she replied quietly. "The shack is empty." She glanced around before prowling over to the shack and carefully pushing the door open with her shoulder.
The door creaked open on rusty hinges and revealed the tiny interior of the shack. It was dark, and consisted of nothing more than two empty rooms, one of which had a ruined old stove.
Jaz wrinkled his snout. "Egh! It smells like wet mold."
Shota moved past the two tigers and entered the tiny building. "They said people go in but never come out, right?" He began to examine the walls and floors. "There must be something…yeah, here." He crouched down to grab at a loose board and pulled it up, revealing a trapdoor with a ladder leading into darkness.
"Do we have to go down there?" Jaz folded his ears back.
Michiru leaned over the trapdoor and stared into the darkness with her ears angled forward. After a few moments, she turned to the boys and spoke. "I don't sense anyone down there, either. Let's check it out."
"Let me go first, then," Shota told her.
"Great," Jaz said as Shota began to descend the ladder. "This is just great."
They had to turn back into their human forms to go through the trapdoor. At the bottom, the place was far darker than the shack, but they found that they had more than enough room to turn back into tigers.
"I can't see anything at all," Shota grumbled. "What gives, Tsume? Hey, can't tigers see in the dark?"
"Well," Michiru said from behind him, "yes. Far better than a human can, at least. I can see a little bit. It seems to be a tunnel. Like an underground passageway."
"Smells like dirt," Jaz said from somewhere off to the side. He suddenly yelped, causing the other two to jump.
"What happened?" Shota asked.
"Sorry… I just stepped on something. It felt like metal."
Shota followed his voice with his hand outstretched until he felt Jaz's fur. "Where is it?"
Jaz carefully grabbed Shota's sleeve with his teeth and guided his hand down to the object.
"Feels like…" he twisted something on it and it suddenly glowered with a small flame. "A lantern." He stood up and held the lantern up to peer down the tunnel. "I'd assume this was a tunnel for transporting drugs if the Ōkami-Kage weren't involved. If it's them, then this is more likely to be a place to move abducted people, right?"
Michiru nodded. "Let's follow it for a bit. I'll let you guys know if I sense anyone along the way. Remember, our instructions are to locate and apprehend Doku-Kage. If there ends up being multiple clan members, we have to retreat."
"Right. I remember."
In the cool, damp darkness, it felt as though they had been walking for nearly an hour. The whole time, Michiru kept her eyes and ears forward, hardly blinking as she used her Aura Quirk to "see." Shota would glance over at her from time to time, checking her body language. When her ears twitched, it was because she heard something new or distinct. When her whiskers twitched, it was because she felt a change in the airflow or sensed something moving. He would then follow the direction her eyes would glance, but the only other living things they had encountered so far were simply small geckos and insects. After some time, she suddenly halted and leaned her head forward. Shota and Jaz stopped, too, and they watched her from the corners of their eyes. The fur along her neck and spine was beginning to bristle.
"There's a larger aura up ahead," she said, barely above a whisper. "But…" She continued forward, and they followed. "As I thought…" They stopped and looked between the two branching tunnels.
"Of course," Shota grunted.
"I can't tell which tunnel leads to the aura I'm sensing," Michiru said. "The figure is in the middle of them. It could be either one, or they could both lead to the same place. I don't know."
"Is it moving?"
"No."
"What shape is it?"
"I…" She folded her ears back and looked upset.
"Tsume's been teaching you how to focus better and 'see' the shapes," Shota told her. "You've done it before. I know you have. You can do it again."
She remained silent and stared at what to them was just a dirt wall. "It's…large… About the size of myself or Jaz. It's black, mostly."
"Black? They have colors?"
She nodded. "The color reflects the individual's personality or intentions. Black is not evil, per say, but it certainly isn't good. Like you."
"Me?"
"Your aura is mainly dark blue, like my brother's, but yours has a tinge of black. It's because there's something that's happened in life you haven't forgiven or overcome yet."
He felt a little awkward now. "You can seriously read that much into people? Er, a-anyways, what shape is it, Michi? The shape."
"Sorry. Um… Quadrupedal…mammalian, maybe? Ears…um, I think it's a wolf. It has to be."
"That, or an overgrown dog," Jaz said. "Honestly, I'm hoping for a dog."
"Doubt that," Shota grunted as he shined the lantern down each of the tunnels. "So, an Ōkami-Kage really is here… But which path do we take?"
Jaz sniffed at the air. "All I can smell is wet soil and…actually, I'm not sure what this new smell is."
Shota looked at him. "Which one is it coming from?"
Jaz sniffed a bit more and followed his nose over to the tunnel on the right. "Erm, here. It's strongest from this one. Should we all go? Or should we still check the other one?"
"If we split up, someone is going to be left on their own," Michiru said. "That's not a good call here."
"I agree," Shota said.
The three of them gathered together and slowly made their way down the tunnel on the right. They quickly fell silent and stepped lightly to avoid making noise.
"Wait," Jaz whispered urgently. "Shota, put out the light!"
"What?" He turned it off, despite questioning him.
"There's something weird in the air… It seems flammable."
"I can't see."
"Neither can I now," Jaz told him. "It's foggy. It might be Doku-Kage's Quirk…"
"I can still see the aura," Michiru told them. "But we'll need to move quickly, before the smog really takes effect. Breathe carefully. Shota, you might do well to cover your mouth and nose with your cloth or something."
"What about you two?"
"My Aura Power is stronger in this form, and Jaz can't use his electricity in human form. We're just going to have to do this quickly."
They continued. It took only mere moments after they did for Shota to notice the heavy feeling and odd smell in the air. It felt like walking out into a thick, humid fog in the morning, but instead of wetness, it smelled similar to sulfur and made his nose wrinkle. Covering his face helped, but the smog was becoming more potent. They were getting closer to the source. Since he could not see at all, he kept one hand on Michiru's shoulder while Jaz brushed up against her other side.
Suddenly, the ground shook and something heavy fell behind them with a deep thud. They spun around and froze. After a while of nothing happening, as the dusty debris settled, Shota asked quietly, "What happened?"
Jaz reached out with his tail and brushed it against something. "It's a wall," he said. "It suddenly appeared behind us. They know we're here!"
"If they didn't, that wall certainly let them know," Shota grunted.
There was a loud bang and a painfilled snarl from Jaz. Several lights suddenly came on one-by-one along the tunnel with loud thunks until the one just above lit up. Shota shielded his eyes and Michiru cringed from the bright light. There was a white haze around them reflecting the lights.
"Jaz!"
Shota turned at hearing Michiru's shout and saw the yellow tiger collapsed on the ground. There was a bullet wound in his shoulder.
"Missed."
Shota and Michiru spun around at the unfamiliar voice and found a person wearing a gas mask and brandishing a pistol.
"Just a shoulder shot," the man said. "Not fatal. Tch! Night vision is useless when there's all this damned smog."
"He's not Ōkami-Kage," Michiru told Shota.
He quickly glanced at the man's head and found that he had regular human ears instead of the wolf ears the Ōkami-Kage were known to have. "Michi!"
"Yeah!"
As Shota moved, the man shot another bullet, but Michiru's barrier blocked it. The man jumped as it ricocheted and nearly caught his leg. Shota was quickly upon him, but the man was surprisingly far nimbler than expected and managed to dodge him as well.
"Shit. Doku!"
At his shout, the area began to fill with more smog, obscuring their vision. Shota took a step back but suddenly found that his equilibrium was upset, and he stumbled as the lights around him seemed to spin. Dizziness, fatigue, headaches, hallucinations… He was starting to feel the effects of the smog all at once.
"Shota."
He spun around at the sound of his name and reached out, grabbing the thick fur and skin around Jaz's neck to stop himself from falling. "Jaz…are you?"
"I'm fine. It stings, but… I think the sleepiness I'm feeling is from the smog."
"Yeah…" It was hard to breathe. "Where is… Michi?"
"I'm over here," her voiced answered from somewhere. "In front of you two by a couple paces."
Shota looked around but only saw white smog and bright lights swirling around him. Which way was "in front?" He felt like he was not standing on solid ground and the only tangible thing he could cling to at the moment was Jaz, so he held tightly as he tried to breathe.
"I… I can't…"
He heard something nearby and thought that perhaps he had imagined it until he noticed Jaz looking in the same direction. Suddenly, a blur of dark purple and green leapt at them from the smog with a vicious snarl. He saw a flash of sharp teeth, heard Jaz's roar, and felt himself get knocked over. The sounds of fighting continued, but they were fading in and out, getting louder and quieter as his vision darkened. The lack of breathable air was going to cause him to lose consciousness.
"Shota!"
He felt something cold and wet touch his face and turned his head to see a pink nose. "Michi… Can't Erase his Quirk…can't see straight… Hard to breathe."
"I know," she said gently as she allowed him to use her fur to pull himself up. "But the smog will stay even if you did Erase his Quirk. We need to prevent him from making more."
"How?" He leaned heavily against her.
She took a moment to catch her breath before she answered. "The smog…comes from his mouth. You can bind his jaws shut. I can see him, both of them, and Jaz."
"Too tired… Dizzy…"
"I know. You can do it, though. I'll help you." She began to lead him through the smog. "Shota," she said when she stopped. She wrapped her tail around him to hold him up and facing the direction she needed him to. "That's forward, Shota. He's about two yards in front of you!"
He grabbed the cloth around his neck and thrust it into the haze. Feeling it snag something, he tightened it, but he had no strength left. Michiru grabbed the cloth in her teeth and yanked it, pulling something down to the ground and over to them. They had caught both Jaz, by the shoulders and arms, and Doku-Kage by the hindleg. The purple and green wolf snarled and lifted his head, but Jaz swiped his tail around and hit the wolf in the face, zapping him with electricity and effectively stunning him. Shota quickly bound his mouth shut and the rest of his limbs before collapsing to the ground himself.
Michiru looked around, seemed to spot something, then used her body to cover Shota as she began to form a barrier around him and herself. "Jaz, let it loose!"
Without hesitation, Jaz let out a furious snarl, sending electricity from his pelt in all directions for a good five seconds or so before stopping. Both Doku-Kage and the man in the gasmask were out cold on the ground, their fur and/or clothes smoking.
Shota could hardly recall what happened after that, and he had woken up in the hospital in the same room as Jaz. Jaz informed him that Michiru ended up having to drag everyone out all on her own, as he had also passed out from the smog. Despite everything, the gas had not actually harmed their bodies in any particular way, but the lack of oxygen had made them very tired for a while. The coarse fur of Jaz's tiger form somehow helped him so that the bullet wound in his shoulder was not very deep. They did, however, have to dig the bullet out while he was unconscious and still a tiger. When he came to, he was allowed to transform into his human form, where they finished tending the wound completely and wrapped his shoulder in bandages. Out of the three of them, Michiru slept the longest. Although the doctor insisted that she was fine, Shota and Jaz still stayed with her in her room until she woke up in the morning.
"What kind of crap was that, Tsume?" Shota was saying into his cellphone.
"Well, you helped, didn't you?" It was on speakerphone.
"Barely!"
"Oh, come now…"
Shota noticed Michiru sitting up and immediately turned to her. "Michi? How are you feeling?"
"Mm." She rubbed her eyes. "Groggy. Are you okay? And Jaz?"
"I'm fine," Jaz said from her other side.
"Tsume," Michiru said.
"Yes?" came the reply.
"When you come back, I'm gonna punch you."
"What did I do!?"
"You know what you did."
"Hey, now! You've all got to learn to be able to handle yourselves in disadvantageous situations like that." He sounded serious now. "All things considered, I think you did rather well."
"What do you mean?" Shota grumbled. "Jaz got shot and I ended up blacking out. Michi had to drag us all out on her own before she passed out, too."
"Yes, but you all succeeded. You managed to apprehend Doku-Kage and whoever that other villain was. And although one of you did get hurt, it was not severely and no one died. Sounds like a job well-done to me!"
"If you say so…"
"You doubt too much, Shota! You succeeded, so good job, all of you! As for any qualms you may have about your personal performances, take it as a learning opportunity and work on it. And Jaz! You were very brave!"
Jaz winced a little. "Oh… N-Not really, but…thanks, Tsume."
"What are they going to do with Doku-Kage?" Shota asked.
"He's been placed in containment in Tartarus," Tsume replied. "I imagine they are going to try and interrogate him, but I doubt they will learn anything. He is devoutly loyal to Chinō-Kage. This is the first Ōkami-Kage to be captured, you know!"
"Seems almost too easy…"
"I agree."
They all looked at the phone.
"Do you think he intended to get captured?" Michiru inquired.
"I'm not sure. It's possible, but it's also possible that he greatly underestimated you all and simply screwed up. They'll be monitoring him closely. Ah, I've got to go now. I'll call again sometime this afternoon. Get some rest, all of you! Love you, Michi!"
"Love you, too, niisan."
To be continued…
Doku-Kage means Poison Shadow. He can breathe out a toxic smog from his mouth, but not his nose for some reason... It stinks! Smells like sulfur, and if you weren't aware, sulfur smells kinda like rotten eggs. Yuck! His nose acts like a natural gas mask filter, so he's immune to his own smog and most other gaseous poisons.