"Confounded, though immortal. But his doom, reserved him to more wrath; for now the thought both of lost happiness and lasting pain torments him."

-Paradise Lost


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Eyes forward, Shirong*. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left.

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Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left.

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Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left. Just as the instructors taught you.

pitter-patter-pitter-patter

Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left. Just as the instructors taught you. Ignore the taste of ash, and the drumbeat of rain.

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Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left.

Just as the instructors taught you. Ignore the taste of ash, and the drumbeat of rain, and the feeling of cracked stone and rusty metal crunching beneath his heels.

But even so, it's impossible to ignore just one of those things when there are important places to be. Important places to be, and important messages to deliver. There's no one else to run and deliver the message, not anymore, and there won't be if an enemy shinobi get's the drop on him somewhere along the way from Command to Outpost A and slashes his throat with a kunai from behind, so he has to keep his wits about him. Shirong has to keep his wits about him and keep moving forward.

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But even so, there could always be an enemy shinobi around any corner. Shirong's gaze darts from the crumbling pieces of giant, jagged stone to the bent, broken skeletons of great, metal beasts that litter the factory floor intermittently to everywhere else in-between. Between and above and besides, to the rows of scorched, empty window frames and to where other decimated complexes of buildings lie beyond, and then to the milky-grey, swirling sky above as Shirong frantically scans the square length of jutting, chipped brick that was once the building's ceiling before a thunderous, not-too distant boom echoes across the city.

A small downpour of chalky dust, rusty nails and sharp stone fragments comes pouring down from the remains of the second floor and down onto his head as the foundation of the factory shakes, the chunks of gravel hitting the top of Shirong's head while the downpour of cinders dusts just about every part of his body as Shirong is shook hard enough to be thrown to the floor in an ashy, soggy heap. His glasses slip down the sweaty, slick bridge of his nose in the process with and land on the concrete floor with a gut-wrenching clatter, and a jolt of cold fear, colder than the rain coming down from above, runs down Shirong's spine as he immediately hoists himself off of the floor as fast he can and wipes away his blurry vision with his dirty, gloved hand.

The haze of soot and cinders clears, finding a new home with the accumulated detritus in the palm of his clothed hand, and Shirong's eyes immediately narrow in on a glinting, sleek shape at the center of his blurred vision. Shirong wastes no time scrambling over to it on his hands and knees, arriving at them only a few seconds later and gingerly picking them off the floor to inspect them with close eyes and numb care. The lenses are still intact, thank Sage, with only a few new chips in the glass joining the ones that were already there. The chassis is fine as well, and the scratched metal doesn't raise a thought of a concern with Shirong as he quickly wipes down the smudged, wet lenses with the hem of his cloak's sleeve and places them back upon his face.

No, what does concern Shirong is getting a move on. Of course something had to slow him for even just a second, and slowing down for even just a second is the same as stopping and stopping get's a kunai to the lung or a lightning bolt to the stomach or a sword through the neck or-

Another thunderclap blasts across the horizon, not strong enough to knock Shirong to the floor once again but still too close for comfort, so close that he can hear the faint sound of shattering brick. The building shakes again, dispelling more of its remains, and Shirong leaps to his feet and breaks out into a harried jog. No, no, no. Enough of that. Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left. Just as the instructors taught you. Ignore the taste of ash, and the drumbeat of rain, and the feeling of cracked stone and rusty metal crunching beneath his heels. Keep moving forward; there's only a little ways to go to Outpost A, apparently. Has he already gotten so close and just hasn't noticed?

Or maybe... it's the front that's getting closer.

Eyes forward, Shirong. One foot in front of the other. Right-left, right-left. Just as the instructors taught you. Ignore the taste of ash, and the drumbeat of rain. Ignore the crackle of static in the air and the way the rain drips down the metal of your headband, down the lenses of your glasses as you run out of the ruins of this factory and into the streets of Kanepa.

The wide, destroyed streets of the city sprawl out before Shirong and wind into the distance, deeper into the beating heart of Kanepa, and have come to resemble something along the lines of rivers instead of streets. Great rivers flooded to their limits with broken brick, splintered wood and shattered glass, with stray hunks of twisted steel jutting out into the air as if they were islands in the stream. It's not just a stream in name only; Shirong almost loses his footing once or twice on the wet, slippery debris, but is still moving slow enough to catch himself just moments before falling and having an eyeball or a leg be gouged out by a stray, sharp shard of rubble. Too slow for comfort, but safely navigating around the wreckage takes time, and not safely navigating always ends up with someone hurt. How is Shirong supposed to get to the front and deliver Command's orders if he gashes himself on a piece of metal and has to sit down and then eventually bleeds to death, bleeds to death alone in a pile of stone with no one to take Command's orders off his body and keep going?

No, no. Shirong has to make it to Outpost A, has to deliver his orders, has to take his time; slow is smooth and smooth is fast. The short, loud bursts of thunderclaps from the distance have died down suddenly, leaving only the deep sound of rain coming down in sheets from the cloudy, swirling sky and hitting bent, charred metal in a rhythmic beat to fill the silence, alongside Shirong's own deep, steady breathes and the crunch of debris breaking and snapping beneath his boot heels as Shirong skitters across the field of debris.

Right-left, right-left, in steady rhythm, Shirong. Move forward, across the fields of rubble, and then make turns down a few more wrecked roads, and then make a few more into the cramped alleyways once the piles of debris become too high to scale, and then move forward again, Shirong. Keep your head on a swivel, Shirong. He knows the routes through the city like the back of his hand, spends every night in his thread-bare tent studying the maps once, twice, thrice before going to sleep, and then runs them day-in, day-out. The Srijan Warehouse, home of Outpost A and it's garrison, is somewhere near the center of the city, all those miles away from Command at the furthest point of the front, and Shirong has to get to it.

Right-left, right-left, in steady rhythm, Shirong. Through the rain, through the rubble and through the mud. He keeps jogging on, through the ruined streets, Right-left, right-left, the sound of bootsteps against the hard surface of the crumbling streets reaching Shirong's ears as the buzzing sound, the same sense of anxiety and awareness that's always burned away at the in the back of his head, hums louder and louder with each passing second, with each passing minute, with each passing-

The blinding edge of a kunai flashes white in front of Shirong's eyes, slicing clean through a few stray, wet locks of ashy-white hair that were hanging down in front of his eyes just a moment ago, sending them dancing in the air as the singular strands separate from one another and his body moves on it's own. Shirong falls back onto his ass in a sopping heap, jaw rattling in tandem with the pouches of kunai and shuriken strapped to his right leg as his body hits the pavement, and for a moment his vision spins. Not only because his body got shaken, but so did his nerves.

There's nary a thought in Shirong's mind as he scrambles to hug up against the cool, brick façade of the skeletal building he was running besides, only a spinning whirlwind of fear and panic that forces heaving gasps of air in and out of Shirong's lungs as he attempts to collect his thoughts fast enough so that he doesn't get killed. So that was a kunai, yes, he almost just got his eyes taken out by a kunai, and-

Shirong's hand creeps down to his right thigh instinctually, down to where the kunai they gave him are stored safely in a pouch strapped to his leg, but stops mid-reach. The rain is still coming down in thick sheets, beating down on Kanepa's body in pulsing waves and providing a constant backdrop of noise... one that's completely unbroken. There's no quick, biting line of words between enemies, or harsh, barked orders from their commander, or even the slapping of boots against pavement as the enemy charges around the corner to rip him to pieces or anything else. No crackle of the inferno as they launch a fireball to turn Shirong into an ashy smear on the ground, or the buzz of concentrated static moments before he's blown to pieces by a bolt of lightning.

Just... nothing. No sign of the enemy. Just silence, and the sound of pounding rain, and the frenzy of his own mind as it produces an idea from its chaos.

Quietly, cautiously, Shirong sidles over to the very edge of the corner of the building, halting just a second before he comes out into the open view of the intersection and reaching up to gingerly pull his glasses from his face. His vision blurs into a haze of soft colors and fuzzy shapes, like it always has, as Shirong maneuvers his spectacles to a position just barely beyond his own on the other edge of the corner, but not enough that Shirong can't see what's reflected in the shine of the lenses.

A warehouse whose rectangular length is made up of harsh concrete as far as the eye can see is mirrored in his left lens, one whose body is scored with sooty, black scorch marks and pockmarked with jagged, open holes in its walls. A long, uneven line of shattered stone appears to extend around and ring the entirety of the warehouse, a stark outline of an outer wall that's been utterly decimated by battle, while the warehouse's massive, sliding metal door that serves as its entrance is bent and dented in various places. Those aren't the only signs of an attack, though; bodies of enemy shinobi litter the yard and street in front of the warehouse intermittently, their lifeless, green and gray-suited bodies lying in broken and bloodied heaps upon the ground as the rain pours and drips down on top of dead bodies.

As if that wasn't enough of an indicator that Shirong's found his mark, the presence of shinobi clad in the colors and headbands of Amegakure surely confirms it. They glare out from the dark shadows of the warehouse's interior through the rows of broken windows lining the upper floor, beneath the line of characters that spell out "SRIJAN WAREHOUSE" in thick, black ink across the chipped stone.

"D-Don't attack!" Shirong's voice crawls out in a high-pitched stutter from behind the corner as he places his glasses back upon his nose, but still loud enough to be heard over the sound of the constant downpour, "I'm friendly!"

A beat of silence, and then harshly, distantly; "Identify yourself!"

Shirong wastes no time responding; "Genin Meng Shirong, sir! I... I'm a runner, with orders from Command!"

Another ripple of silence, longer than before but still long enough to make Shirong think for a moment that it's all over again before that same hard voice comes yelling out from beyond the corner; "Come out with your hands in the air!"

He's up on his feet in a flash, placing his hands palm-up in the air above his head as he slowly creeps around the corner and into plain view. The cold rain does nothing to soothe his nerves as the droplets of water splash against his open, shaking hands, and neither does the coarse order that comes next; "Stop! Turn around!"

Shirong's vision spins as he does so, morphing from the imposing visage of the warehouse and the sheer havoc surrounding it into a scene of one of the decimated husks of brick buildings on the other side of the street. What was once a storefront of some kind has been transformed in a burnt out shell, with the smoldering body of an enemy shinobi draped halfway and head-first out and over the lip of some kind of entryway that's been blasted into the brick wall. Shirong's eyes focus in on the gashes in their green flak jacket and the raw scorch mark running up the left side of their body and from their fingerless hand seconds before another command comes down from on high.

"Start walking backwards slowly!"

Left-right, left-right, left-right; Shirong does as they say, the heels of his boots squelching against the wet, slippery pavement as he trundles backwards at a snail's pace, making sure that every shuddering step is well placed and well timed. There's a sharp smell to the atmosphere, a witch doctor's brew of pungent scents, and Shirong's stomach lurches in an entirely uncomfortable way as the stench of wet hair, soggy gunpowder and tangy iron invades his lungs. Once or twice, his heels bump against something hard or plant themselves into something soft that isn't the pavement on his slow march backwards, and Shirong doesn't dare look down to see what it is; he already knows, anyway, but it's easier this way. It just is.

"Stop!"

It only takes the breadth of a second to comply with their commands, and Shirong simply does, his body screeching to halt to sway and shake in the frigid rain like a scarecrow in the field of bodies and debris as the sound of squelching bootsteps, this time not his own, fills the air. The slow rhythm of stone crunching under rubber grows ever closer, alongside the buzzing at the back of Shirong's mind. His eyes stare forwards at the broken rows of buildings at the far edge of his vision, but don't really see. No, what Shirong is really looking at is the human outline of jittering static at the center of his mind's eye as the low hum grows to a fever pitch, screaming bloody murder as the electric presence creeps closer and closer until-

s n a p.

If there's a way that Shirong can describe the sensation, it's that it's like pressing an open palm down into a plate of hot coals, except amplified across one's entire body. Foreign chakra burns along every centimeter of his system, from the flat of his feet to the crown of his head and cooks him from the inside out, but only for a second. As soon as the feeling arrives, it vanishes, leaving Shirong dry heaving over a corpse whose face is twisted into an agonized grimace as a masculine voice states:

"He's clear."

Shirong tears his gaze away from the shinobi's wide, glassy eyes as fast as he can and turns his head to shoot a instinctual glare at the man behind him, but can only catch a glimpse of dusky skin and gold eyes before a strong grip tightens around the neck of his cloak and hauls him forcefully off of his feet, into the depths of the warehouse. In a flash, his vision is filled with bright, blinding light, and Shirong's eyes slam shut on instinct so they don't get burnt out of his skull as the horrid, screeching sound of metal grinding against stone scrapes across his ears. He screws his eyes tighter, forcing the speckles and blobs of neon color seared into the darkness behind his eyes to dissipate into nothing, and the last beads of luminosity shrink into the void seconds before a thunderous boom echoes through the interior of the warehouse and punctuates the end of the deafening blare of the sliding metal door slamming shut.

Shirong tears his gaze away from the shinobi's wide, glassy eyes as fast as he can and turns his head to shoot a instinctual glare at the man behind him, but can only catch a glimpse of dusky skin and gold eyes before a strong grip tightens around the neck of his cloak and hauls him forcefully off of his feet, into the depths of the warehouse. In a flash, his vision is filled with bright, blinding light, and Shirong's eyes slam shut on instinct so they don't get burnt out of his skull as the horrid, screeching sound of metal grinding against stone scrapes across his ears. He screws his eyes tighter, forcing the speckles and blobs of neon color seared into the darkness behind his eyes to dissipate into nothing, and the last beads of luminosity shrink into the void seconds before a thunderous boom echoes through the interior of the warehouse and punctuates the end of the deafening blare of the sliding metal door slamming shut.

Finally, nervously, Shirong is able to gather up enough mental stamina to crack a singular eye open, and then the next when the bright, sodium glow of the ceiling lamps don't immediately scorch his sight with their rays, coming face to face with the first scene of some lucid arrangement in what feels like the entire span of a few days. Moldering wooden boxes, from small to large in size, litter the expanse of the concrete floor in random order, having been knocked form their perches at the top of what few piles of cargo that still remain inside of the warehouse. The piles themselves provide cover to makeshift camps made up of threadbare bedrolls and rugged cooking equipment, while stray kunai, shuriken and other assorted ninja tools speckle their breadth like flecks of paint. Most of them seem to be empty, though, save for a few at the very edges of the interior where crippled, groaning bodies are being tended to by their minders.

Most of the shinobi themselves, however, line the length of the upper walkway sporadically, languishing and sitting in positions that give views out into the desolate streets and atrophied buildings surrounding the warehouse. Some talk with each other, some polish their kunai, some of the few brave (or desperate) enough to carry firearms in place of blades clean the long barrels and wooden stocks, but most are glaring out of the corner's of their eyes down at Shirong like bats in the shadows where light doesn't reach. The force of their stares is enough to make Shirong deaf to the words coming from right next to him.

"...The messenger, yeah?"

Shirong's gaze snaps to his left, and then up, towards where the gold-eyed man is staring down his straight nose expectantly at Shirong, as if waiting for an answer. Now that Shirong is able to get a better look at him, it's evident that he's dressed in the black jumpsuit and grey smock of a Chūnin, with a long white scarf wrapped around his neck and his headband tied around his right bicep. It's scored with scratches and pockmarked with speckles of ash and dirt, much like his sun-kissed skin, and the sudden tapping on fingers in restless rhythm against the face of the steel plate as Gold-Eyes crosses his arms reminds Shirong that he was asked a question, as if Gold-Eyes clearing his throat didn't do that already.

"Right, I mean, Yes... sir." Shirong stutters out, and Gold-Eyes gives him an inscrutable look before turning on his heel and motioning for Shirong to follow him.

"Come on, then. Better get you to Captain Suyin*." Gold-Eyes states, and Shirong follows after him in a slow, uneasy lope, making sure to stay behind Gold-Eyes as the two of them make their way over to one of the metal staircases leading up to the upper floor whose paint finished is flecked with spots of disrepair, revealing the steel underneath. The steel steps creak and groan under both of their wet heels as Gold-Eyes trundles up the stairs and onto the walkway with Shirong trailing behind him, the protests of the staircase that echoed through the breadth of the warehouse a moment ago transforming into the mere thunk of bootsteps against fortified girders.

The shinobi lining the upper walkway and holding watch out the windows of the right side of the warehouse make nary a movement as Shirong and Gold-Eyes make their way to a smaller version of the sliding metal door located on the bottom floor, with the few that do notice their presence parting like wheat swaying in the breeze to allow the two of them access to the end of the gangplank. They arrive at the door a minute or two later, standing in front of the steel door that is only a few meters taller than Gold-Eyes himself, with the expected wear and tear to match his own. He reaches out, raps on the door in a specific motion once, and then does it all over again a second time, but in a different order. Shirong doesn't have even a second to try and memorize the order, because a burst of white-blue chakra flares across the face of the door in the austere pattern of a circle before disappearing in a flash, leaving the taste of tangy salt on his tongue as the door slides open halfway to allow them inside.

The two of them are greeted by what was obviously once an office space of some kind. Wet scraps of tattered paper stick to the floor, the writing upon them long having since faded and blurred by moisture and time, while a byōbu lies in a wrecked heap of lacquered wood and painted, flimsy paper alongside the tea table and it's cushions that once sat behind it. The only source of light is a single dull electric lamp that hangs from a bare cable from the ceiling, illuminating a desk that was once made of rich mahogany sits tilted to the side with a rumpled bedroll next to it and clearly revealing the splinters and scratches in it's glossy veneer, and behind the desk sits an unkempt, charcoal-haired woman clad in the flak jacket and cloak of a Jōnin.

Captain Suyin looks up from the scroll she'd been pouring over and examines Shirong with sharp, dark eyes as she leans back in a creaky, wooden chair that clearly does not match the desk, peering over her steepled fingers at him as if he was some sort of exotic insect pinned to a slide. Shirong stiffens in place, muscles locked in the way that they always become when someone of authority really looks at him, but this doesn't do anything to stifle the way Golden-Eyes thumps Shirong on the back and pushes him forwards towards the desk.

"Genin Meng Shirong, from Command, ma'am," Shirong quickly rattles off while bowing at the waist, having clearly gotten the message, "I'm here to deliver a message."

"Oh?" Captain Suyin inquires while raising an eyebrow, "I wasn't aware that the brass started using children to do their busywork. Which dim-wit you studied under gave you your headband so early?"

For a moment, Shirong's mind is wiped clean of any thoughts, and what comes crawling out of his mouth is; "...Permission to speak freely, ma'am?"

Captain Suyin's eyes narrow ever so slightly; "Granted."

"...I'm not sure I understand."

This time, Captain Suyin's brow furrows in confusion; "How so?"

Shirong's eyes dart up to catch a look at Golden-Eyes before his gaze drops down to the floor, unable to meet her eyes even though this isn't his fault at all; "...I'm a Genin, ma'am. I didn't study under anyone."

Captain Suyin tilts her head forward and shoots Shirong a disbelieving look from beneath her eyebrows; "So what, Command just picked you out from a bunch of civilians off the street?"

Shirong doesn't answer. The silence answers in his stead, and Captain Suyin scoffs in a manner that sounds like she's one part exasperated and one part exhausted; "We're really that pressed for manpower, huh? Can you even use chakra?"

"...That's how they select us from the rest, ma'am." Shirong answers as neutrally as possible, although he's sure that she can hear the hollow note in his voice. They all can, somehow, and that's exactly how he get into this mess in the first place.

This one, at the very least... not the other one. There's nothing that can be helped about the present situation, really, and if Shirong is being completely honest, he doesn't have a clue on where to start untangling this nightmare. Not when the rain comes down onto his head, not when the flood comes down on his head and the mud and the ash of the war does the same.

(eyes forward, Shirong. one foot in front of the other. right-left, right-left. just as the instructors taught you. the only way out is through.)

"Really. How many Techniques do you know?" Shirong finally looks up, meeting her eyes timidly, and Captain Suyin holds his gaze for a moment before pinching the bridge of her nose and sighing, "Don't even answer that question. Just give me the message."

Shirong complies as quickly as possible, reaching under his cloak and unzipping one of his vest's pouch before rummaging around in it's depths and retrieving a small, parchment scroll that's sealed by a purple tassel tied around it's length as he inches towards Captain Suyin's desk. She snatches it out of his hand as soon as Shirong is close enough to do so, ripping open the scroll with little grace and unfurling it in a flash. Captain Suyin's eyes take in whatever information is detailed on the paper in a flash before a orange flicker from her fingertip sets the scroll ablaze, turning it to mere crumbling ash in front of Shirong's wide eyes.

"Nothing I didn't expect; nothing they didn't expect, either. Looks like our theory was right after all."

"And what is that, ma'am?" Gold-Eyes baritone voice startles Shirong as he speaks from where he has been standing and watching the entirety of their interaction silently behind Shirong at the edge of the room, but Captain Suyin merely looks above Shirong's head and fixes Gold-Eyes with a hard glare.

"We have good reason to believe that Konoha is planning an offensive to finally try and take Kanepa for good, but we've held this city for three months; we can hold it for three more," Captain Suyin declares as she rips open one of her desk drawers and pulls out a paper and an ink brush before setting them both down in front of her and beginning to scrawl out words in hasty, uneven scribbles, "The two of you will make your way back to Command with this report, and then make your way back here with their response as soon as possible."

For a moment, it looks like Golden-Eyes is about to protest, his lips moving silently as they make to open in challenge, but Captain Suyin shoots him a harsh glare that puts down any notion of rebellion.

"Don't protest, Aslani. You have your orders."


Author's Guide:

1*. "Shirong" and "Jeishi" are indeed the same person. In Mandarin culture, one is given a birth name before they eventually choose an adult name, along with following the "Surname, Given Name" formula, making his name read "Meng Shirong/Meng Jeishi" as opposed to "Shirong Meng/Jeishi Meng". Meng is pronounced "Meng" (One Syllable), Shirong is pronounced "She-rong" (Two Syllables) and Jeishi is pronounced "Zhe-shi" (Two Syllables).

2*. There are generally three shinobi ranks: Genin, Chūnin and Jōnin. However, there can still be leadership positions among Jōnin that outrank each other when it comes to unit command, such as Captain or Commander.